Go On As You Never Have
by ESawyer1
Summary: *ON HOLD* He wasnt sure how many years had passed, but he knew that it was enough to know that there would never be anyone else for him. Then, a glimmer of hope in the darkest of days. -Sequel to The Children who Lived-
1. May 3rd, 1998

_**This is a sequel to 'The Children who Lived,'. If I were you, I'd read it first**_

 _ **Also, thanks to FirstThunder13 for helping me develop this.**_

 _ **"It is impossible for you to go on as you were before, so you must go on as you never have,"**_

 _ **\- Cheryl Strayed.**_

"GEORGE! GEORGE!"

He watched as Lydia pushed through the crowd towards her. His heart momentarily stopped beating as he looked at her; her clothes were ripped and dirty, and there was blood covering the left side of her face, slowly dropping onto her neck and chest. He had no idea what had happened, but he knew that whatever she was about to say to him was not good news.

"What's wrong?" He asked, "what's happened?"

But before she could reply, the cold voice of Lord Voldemort sounder throughout the castle and George could not help but flinch. It was as though the Dark Lord was stood right next to him. Lydia whimpered slightly and grabbed onto his hand, squeezing her eyes shut.

"You have fought valiantly. Lord Voldemort knows how to value bravery. Yet you have sustained heavy losses. Lord Voldemort is merciful. I command my forces to retreat, immediately. You have one hour. Dispose of your dead with dignity. Treat your injured,"

There was a flurry of movement as the Death Eaters around them began to leave, and George had never been so happy to see the back of a group of people before.

"I speak now, Harry and Lydia Potter, directly to you. You have permitted your friends to die for you rather than face me yourself. I shall wait for one hour in the Forbidden Forest. If, at the end of hat hour, you have not come to me, have not given yourself up, then battle commences,"

As much as George hated to think it, Voldemort knew Harry and Lydia well. He knew that guilt tripping them into thinking they were the reason so many people were dead would be the best way to get to them. Lydia opened her eyes and looked up at him, her expression was unreadable.

"Don't. Do do it," George said to her, because he knew exactly what she was thinking.

"This time, I shall enter the fray myself, and I shall find you both, and I shall punish every last man, woman and child who has tried to conceal you from me. One hour,"

Neville had joined them and was shaking his head at Lydia, though George did not think that Lydia was paying him much attention. He glanced over at the doors of the Entrance Hall and, for a moment, he could envision Voldemort walking through the doors, his wand raised high, looking for Harry and Lydia. And yet, the thought of Lord Voldemort was not scary to him. The scariest though was the possibility that he might lose Lydia.

"Potter," George jumped as McGonagall walked over to them, looking weary, "I know what you are thinking, and I implore you not to hand yourself over. We will not be defeated,"

George looked down at Lydia and frowned. She looked defeated and that was not a look that he was used to seeing on her. Even in the darkest of moments, there was a fire burning brightly behind her eyes.

"Lyds, who's dead?" George asked, speaking very slowly, "who is it?"

Ever so slowly, she looked up and met his eyes, "I am so sorry,"

"Who is it?"

"There's nothing I could do. Nothing any of us could do,"

George stared at her for a moment longer and then he realised who she was talking about. It it couldn't be him. No, it couldn't be him because he wouldn't die. He was not the type of person who would die. He was too funny, too clever, too good at duelling for dying. She must have got it wrong. She must have saw someone else die.

"Don't tell me he's dead. Lydia, do not tell me that he's gone,"

She nodded.

He yelled and fell to the round, tears streaming thick and fast down his face as his body began to shake uncontrollably. Fred Weasley was dead. He was gone. The months that George had spent at Malfoy Manor were not nearly as painful as the sickening realisation that his twin was gone. He felt Lydia kneel next to him and wrap her arms around him, pulling him as close as she could to her. He wrapped his arms around her waist and sobbed into her t-shirt.

Finally, after what felt like hours, Lydia spoke again.

"Georgie. Georgie we need to go," she was speaking so softly that he could barely hear her.

"I c-can't,"

"George, please," she said, "he's going to come soon. We can't be here when he does. You can't be here when he does. You need to be out of the way,"

"Y-you can't be here w-when he c-comes!" George yelled through his sobs, holding onto her tighter, "You c-can't go too!"

"No, of course not," Lydia said, "I won't be anywhere near him. Just get up, please, Georgie,"

Deep down, he knew that everything she was saying to him was a lie, but he deserved this he deserved to pretend that she would not have to face Voldemort one way or the other in the end. Gently, Lydia took his hands and helped him off the floor. His legs felt weak and he gripped onto her as though she were his lifeline. She might have been in his lifeline.

"In here," Neville said to them, pointing over at the Great Hall.

"Thanks, Nev," Lydia whispered.

The Great Hall was full of both the survivors and the dead, but George could take no notice of anything but his family. They were gathered around Fred's body and George hurried over to them. He was terrified of seeing his brother dead, but more terrified of the possibility that he might never be able to say goodbye to him.

"George!" His mum gasped. She was knelt on the floor next to Fred's head whilst his dad knelt besides her, "Georgie, dear, come here-"

He did not say anything and just hugged his mother. His poor mother, who should not have to go through this. Arthur came up behind him and gently put his hand on George's shoulder, sobbing quietly. The sound of his fathers sobs hurt George in a way that he could not believe; his father never cried.

"I'm so sorry, son," he whispered, suddenly gripping his shoulder tightly, "but we're going to get through this. Here, do you want to - do you want to see him?"

Through his tears, George nodded and turned to look at Fred. His hair, so covered in dust looked almost black and was matted with blood that was starting to form a pool around the back of his head. Both of his arms looked to be completely broken and there was blood coming out of the corner of his mouth. The breath caught in George's throat and he felt himself stagger back. Fred did not deserve to go like this. His did not deserve to go at all. Ron caught him before he fell backwards and held onto him as he slowly sank to the floor and dropped his head into his hands.

"I'm gonna be here for you, Georgie, whatever you need," Ron said, quietly.

George turned to look at his youngest brother and was suddenly taken aback by how much he had grown, "I know, Ron," he turned away from Ron and saw Lydia. She was hovering awkwardly in front of him, her eyes flitting from Fred and then back over to him.

He leapt up and walked over to her, putting his arms around her and resting his chin on the top of her head, "I don't know what I'm going to do. The shop..."

Lydia looked up at him and wiped his eyes, "We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Whatever happens, we'll get through it,"

He nodded but he wasn't really sure that he believed her. He would never be able to see himself in a world where he could get through this. Harry came up behind Lydia and tapped her on the shoulder. They had a whispered conversation that George knew he didn't have to be apart of and waited until Lydia turned back to him.

"I need to go and do something,"

Fear started up again and the room around him began to spin, "You're not...you're not handing yourself over, are you?"

"Of course not," she said, "I'll be right back,"

And then she was gone.

George stood in the exact same spot as she had left him in for a while and kept his eyes fixed on the doors of the Great Hall. Soon, he told himself, she would be back with Harry and they would have a plan that would fix everything that happened. The war would be over and they would be free. They could go home and start again.

After a while, he began to panic because she still hadn't come back. He glanced down at his watch and the hour that had passed was soon coming to and end. Wanting fresh air, he glanced at Fred and snuck away from his family, but sneaking away wasn't nearly as fun when Fred wasn't in on the joke. Nothing was as fun when Fred wasn't in on the joke.

He sat on the stone steps of the Entrance Hall and stared out into the grounds, wiping his eyes. The trees of the Forbidden Forest were swaying in the distance and George quickly looked away from them; Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters were in there somewhere and George was not looking forward to them coming back. But then he felt a sudden rush of anger towards every single one of them. It was them, after all, who murdered his brother and them who would have to pay the price for it. Suddenly he gripped hold of his wand and stood up, as though he was going to charge into the forest all alone, it he quickly sat down and stuck his wand back in his pocket. That would be ridiculous, he told himself, there's no way you could take him on on your own.

"George? George? Oh, there you are,"

He turned around just as Charlie sat down next to him and put his arm around him, "Everyone's in the Great Hall-"

"Have you seen Lydia?" he asked, "she went to Dumbledore's office with Harry but I've not seen her since,"

Tears suddenly sprang to Charlie's eyes and George could not understand why. It was only a simple question.

"Harry just told us, George. Oh, I'm so sorry...but, she's gone to Voldemort. She's had to give herself up-"

"NO!" George roared. He jumped up again and launched himself to the Forbidden Forest. He could still get to her, he could convince her to come back. Or let him go with her. At least then he wouldn't be on his own once it was all over. If he shouted loud enough, she would probably be able to hear him. She couldn't have gone far, "LYDIA!"

He felt Charlie grab him and drag him backwards. George spun around and shoved Charlie in the chest. He didn't understand. Lydia didn't have to die. No one had to die. Not anymore. But Charlie was much stronger than he was and he pushed him to the floor.

"If you go after her, you'll only make it harder for her. And he'll just kill you too. Do you want to put mum and dad through that?"

"I don't have anything - not without them," George sobbed.

"George, listen to me. These next few months are going to be really hard, but you have to get through it. For them," Charlie hauled him to his feet and through a hand around his shoulders, "Come on. Let's get away from here,"

The Entrance Hall was packed with people, all of whom kept on giving him annoyingly sympathetic looks. He didn't need sympathy. He just needed people to leave him alone until he was ready.

"I need -"

"It's alright, Georgie," Charlie said, quietly and kissing his temple, "go be alone for a while,"

Dragging his feet, George walked over to the marble staircase and sat down, drawing his knees up to chest. He remembered standing there with Fred on the evening of the Yule Ball, waiting for Lydia. Fred had nudged him and pointed over to the dungeons where she had just come out of. She was smiling, albeit a little awkwardly, and George might have fallen in love with her there and then. He glanced back over at the doors of the Entrance Hall and remembered the last Christmas they had spent with each other at Hogwarts. Slughorn's Party might have been a bit of a disaster but at least the Mistletoe had made her laugh. He probably fell in love with her a little bit more each day and wondered if that would stop now. Pushing that thought from his mind, he rested his forehead on his knees and for a moment, he could feel her lips against his and realised that he hadn't even been able to kiss her one last time.

Someone's arm brushed against George's shoulder and, out of the corner of his eye, he saw Harry. He could not look over at him immediately; they were both in the same situation. They had both lost people they loved the most and George did not know what to say to him.

"You know, if she knew you were crying this much she'd probably tell you to blow off some steam by blowing something up. Or whatever it is you do," Harry said.

"We were going to get married," George said, looking down at the finger that a wedding ring would never sit on, "Fred was going to be my best man..."

"I know," Harry said, his voice shaking, "I wanted to walk her down the aisle..." George nodded and closed his eyes. He could see it now; Lydia wearing a white dress and beaming as she walked down the aisle with Harry. "But, George, in all seriousness, I want to...I want to say thank-you?"

"What for?" George asked, frowning.

"For making her so happy. For loving her so much," Harry said, "and...and I'm sorry that it had to be this way. I wish I could change it,"

"Let's just make sure they didn't for nothing, yeah?" was all that George could manage to say.

Suddenly, Harry yelped and topped down the stairs, holding his forehead. At once, George jumped up and ran after him just as Ron and Hermione appeared next to Harry. Percy ran over to George and gripped his arm, staring out of the Entrance Hall, his mouth hanging open.

"She's gone," Harry gasped, "He did it. He killed her,"

George felt his knees give way and Percy gripped onto him, pulling him up. They followed Harry, Ron, Hermione and Draco outside just as Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters were coming out of the Forbidden Forest. At first, George could not see Lydia but then he saw Hagrid holding something, no, someone, in his arms. From where he was stood, he could almost see her. He could almost see her glasses, her ridiculous hair and the not-quite engagement ring that would never become a true engagement ring.

"Lydia...no.." George whispered, and he dissolved into sobs again, clinging onto Percy for support.

"Lydia Potter, your saving grace, was killed when she was found running away from. The battle. She was more than prepared to leave you all to perish," Lord Voldemort said, "Now, join my ranks, or die,"

All George really wanted to do was shout at Voldemort for how wrong he was. He wanted to make sure that every single person know that Lydia Potter was not a coward. She would never leave anyone behind to die and yet he could not get the words out.

For a while, George lost track of what was happening. He could not pay attention to anything that Voldemort was saying and he couldn't even look over in shock when Neville walked forward. His eyes were planted firmly on the ground and he could no longer look over at Lydia. He forced his eyes shut and tried to think of happier times; he remembered the look of triumph on Fred's face after he pranked the Slytherin Quidditch team and how he had thrown a party in Gryffindor common room just because he could, he remembered the look that Lydia gave him when he told her that he and Fred were dropping out of school. And he remembered the things that he loved about the most; he remembered Fred's raucous laughter and how he could cheer anyone up just by saying one word. He remembered the way Lydia's whole face lit up when she smiled and how her muttered sarcastic comments used to be enough to get him through a bad day.

And now he was faced with the hardest days of his life. He would never hear Fred's laughter again and he would never be able to turn to his twin to cheer him up. He would have to learn to live with never seeing Lydia's bright smile and find some other way to get through a bad day. Unless, of course, he didn't survive the war. Lydia might have been dead, but the fight was far from over. He supposed that now, dying wouldn't be too bad. The thought of death had terrified him for months and months, but now that he was surrounded by it, maybe it wouldn't be so bad.

 _"You've just walked past the entrance to the dungeons!" George called to her as she practically skipped up to marble stairs._

 _She spun back round and grinned at him; her cheeks were rosy from the cold and eyes seemed to be brighter than usual._

 _"Why would I want to go to the dungeons?" She asked him, "it's too cold to be down there. Also too depressing" she added._

 _"You just want to spend more time with me, don't you?" He replied, catching up to her and putting his hands on her waist._

 _"Well, Professor Umbridge said that male and female students can't be within five inches of each other, so you need to back up, Mr Weasley," she said, prodding him in the chest._

 _"There's worse things to get detention for," he shrugged._

 _"Like lying about the Dark Lords return?"_

 _George kissed her quickly, "you always know how to be depressing, don't you?"_

 _"Realistic," she corrected him, "I know how to be realistic,"_

 _"When you two have finished flirting, I'd like to get past before our favourite Defence teacher finds me,"_

 _They turned around to a smirking Fred stood a few steps below them, his arms folded. "Whilst you, my dear brother, have been distracted by a certain Lydia Potter, I have sold a record number of Skiving Snackboxes,"_

George suddenly found himself outside the entrance of the Slytherin common room. He wasn't sure how he'd got away from his family or why he had even thought to walk to here, of all places, but he couldn't be bothered to apply logic to anything. He stared at the bare brick wall and thought about how often he had waited outside here for her. She was usually the first to be out in the morning and always had a story about how Pansy Parkinson was being annoying, or how Draco Malfoy could not go three seconds without insulting her.

 _"Calling me Potty is just boring at this point!" She snapped, "if he got more creative with his insults I might actually appreciate them. I'm better at insulting myself than he is!"_

He turned his back on the Slytherin common room and walked back up to the Entrance Hall. He glanced into the Great Hall but it was too full of people and he already could not deal with the sympathetic looks that people were giving him. He didn't want sympathy, he just wanted Fred and Lydia back. And he could never have them back. He had a sudden burst of hope when he remembered that James had come back after fourteen years of being dead, but that was old magic that even Professor Dumbledore had been shocked by. The burst of hope was quickly replaced by anger towards his old headmaster; he had known that Lydia would have to die and did nothing to try and stop it. He happily watched her move through school, form friendships and even a relationship and not even think about the pain that her untimely death would eventually bring.

Against his better judgement, George hurried passed the Great Hall and up the stairs, his mind set on getting to the headmasters office. This was all Dumbledore's fault. He was the most powerful wizard in the world and he could not figure out a way to win without having to lose Lydia? He could not figure out a way to kill Voldemort without dragging innocent people into it? Could he have not steered them down a different path that would not lead to Fred's death? Dumbledore had always gone on about how love was the most powerful thing in the world, but love wasn't going to bring Fred or Lydia back. It wasn't going to fix anything. Love wasn't going to get him through his grief. He wasn't sure that anything would get through his grief.

When he arrived at Dumbledore's office, Harry, Ron and Hermione were just coming out. Seeing the three of them without Lydia seemed strange. They all looked smaller, somehow. Ron was pale and his eyes were bloodshot, though George was not sure if this was from exhaustion or tears. Perhaps it was both. Hermione was still crying and her hair was falling out of the hair tie that it had been in, but George was sure that the state of her hair was probably the least of her worries. The worst of them was Harry. George could barely bring himself to look at him. His shoulders were sagging and his eyes completely blank. So blank, in fact, that he wasn't even sure if Harry could see anything that was in front of him.

"Where are you going?" Ron asked.

"Up there," George said, pointing to the office.

"Why?" Ron asked.

"I want to - I want to speak to Dumbledore,"

Harry turned to look at him and then nodded, "I get it,"

They all nodded at him and then walked on. George watched them go, wondering if he would ever get used to seeing them without Lydia. They looked oddly misshapen, like a jigsaw with a missing piece. Once they had disappeared around a corner, George walked up the stairs to the headmasters office. He had lost count of the amount of times that he and Fred had been sent to the Headmasters office by Mr Filch. Usually when the got there, Dumbledore would just smile and tell them that they 'ought to be more careful next time,'.

Professor Dumbledore's portrait was hanging above the Headmaster's chair. George looked at it for a moment and then looked away. The other previous Headmasters and Headmistresses were all giving him that same sympathetic look. Even Phineas Nigellus and this made him feel even worse - things must be bad if Phineas Nigellus of all people were feeling empathetic towards him. He looked away from the portraits and at the floor, wondering if this was something ridiculous. He turned to leave but then Dumbledore spoke.

"Mr Weasley, I am so sorry for your loss,"

George turned around and looked up at him, cocking his head to the side slightly. For years, Dumbledore had been somehow who he looked up to. Crazy old Dumbledore who was able to run a school and be respected by the whole Wizarding community. Crazy old Dumbledore who even Lord Voldemort was afraid of.

"Are you?" George asked, his voice shaking, "Are you not glad she's dead? Are you not glad that she had the courage to actually go and do it? Because if she didn't, we'd never win,"

"I am not glad that Lydia is dead, but I am glad that we are finally at peace,"

"At peace?" George asked, "What's peaceful about fifty people dying? What's peaceful about the way that Fred was killed? What's peaceful about all the rebuilding that we're going to have to do? What's peaceful about any of this?" His voice echoed around the room. The other portraits did not react to anything, "How long - how long have you known that she was going to have to die?"

"I always suspected that one of them would have to die," Dumbledore told him, "I realised that it was Lydia in her fifth year-"

"Fifth year?" George repeated, "Nearly - nearly three years ago? You knew! You knew all this time and you never once thought to tell her? To - to warn her that-"

"George, you knew her better than anyone. She would have wasted no time in killing herself," Professor Dumbledore cut across.

"And there was no other way?"

Dumbledore shook his head, "there was no other way,"

"THEN WHY DIDN'T YOU FIND ONE? WHY WERE YOU SO OKAY WITH SENDING A SEVENTEEN YEAR OLD TO DIE? WHY DIDN'T YOU HAVE THE COURAGE TO TELL HER YOURSELF? WHY DIDN'T YOU EXPLAIN ALL THIS TO HER EARLIER? WHY DID YOU HAVE TO DRAG EVERYONE ELSE INTO IT? YOU WERE MEANT TO BE MORE POWERFUL THAN ANYONE ELSE IN THE WORLD AND YET YOU COULDN'T KILL HIM?" George was yelling before he could stop himself, "YOU HAD TO RELY ON TWO SEVENTEEN YEAR OLDS TO DIE? AFTER EVERYTHING YOU'VE DONE? THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT! LYDIA DYING, FRED DYING, LAVENDER DYING, REMUS DYING...THEIR BLOOD IS ON YOUR HANDS! YOU LET THIS HAPPEN!"

"George, there is nothing I could do-"

"BULLSHIT! THAT IS BULLSHIT DUMBLEDORE, AND YOU KNOW IT!" George roared, "THEY SHOULDN'T HAVE HAD TO DIE-" his voice broke, "they all had lives ahead of them...Fred...Lydia had a life ahead of her...we had a life ahead of us together...and now - I have nothing, Dumbledore, I have nothing,"

"Mr Weasley, you know that is not true-"

"James," George said, suddenly, "James, he - he came back! Does that mean...does that mean Lydia might?"

Dumbledore looked at him with a sympathetic look in his eyes and George suddenly wanted to stun the portrait.

"No. Lydia will not come back,"

"Fuck you, Dumbledore,"

With one last withering glare at him, George turned on his heel and stormed out of the room. That had not made him feel better. He did not think that anything would make him feel better every again. When he made it out of the headmasters office, he sank to the floor, sobs wracking his body. He wasn't sure how long he stayed there for. It could have been hours or even days. He only realised that he had not moved for a while when he heard footsteps and felt someone put their hand on his shoulder. He looked up to see Daphne Greengrass looking down at him, her eyes sparkling with tears.

"Sorry, George, I don't want to disturb you its just that, um, if you...if you want to see them, you can,"

"Fred and Lydia?"

She nodded, "Madam Pomfrey is gradually letting people in to see people who, you know..." She cleared her throat and looked away, wiping her eyes, "Sorry, I don't want to cry in front of you. I'm probably just making it worse. I'm sorry."

"Nothing can make it worse," he said.

He dragged himself over to the Hospital Wing. Madam Pomfrey was stood at the doors, wiping her eyes. When she saw him, she clumsily patted his cheek, muttered something about how they would all get through this and directed him to where his family was. Ron was sat next to the bed, not quite looking at Fred whilst Bill stood behind him with his hands on his shoulder. His mum was on the other side, stroking Fred's hair and quietly sobbing as his father stood with his arm around a shell shocked Ginny. He didn't know where the others were, and he almost didn't want to ask. They would probably be with another one of the dead, and he did not have the energy to think about the fact that the number of fatalities stretched far beyond Fred and Lydia.

"Where is she?" George asked, his voice barely above a whisper.

Ron looked over at him, "The corner. F-Fleur, Harry and Hermione are w-with her," quite suddenly, he burst into tears, "I c-can't go and see her. I d-don't want to believe she's dead,"

George slowly walked over to him and helped him up, "Come on, Ronnie, you'll regret it if you don't see her at least once,"

Harry was slumped forward in his chair, holding onto Lydia's hand and sobbing. Hermione was stood at the top of the bed, her head hung. Fleur was stood with her arms wrapped around her, looking at che ceiling. Ron dropped into the seat next to Harry and put his arm around him. At once, Harry let go of his sisters hand and hugged Ron, sobbing even louder. George slowly walked around the bed and sat down, looking at her. Lydia Potter had never looked as peaceful in life as she had done in life. Her head was turned to the side slightly and if George concentrated enough, he could pretend that she was sleeping. His eyes travelled down her neck and he frowned. There was a new jagged scar there, one in the same shape as on her head. It took him a few moments to realise that this was where Lord Voldemort had struck her with the Killing Curse and looked away.

Hesitantly, he picked his hand up and looked down at it. The words 'I could not tell lies,' could still be seen and George felt another rush of anger. She had died for people who had never cared about her in the first place. Slowly, he ran his thumb over her engagement ring and tears stung his eyes again. Deep down, George had always known that their wedding day had been nothing but a fantasy to get them through the war, but that didn't mean that he couldn't mourn the wife he would never have.

"George," Fleur whispered, "Why don't we take 'er engagement ring off...'ave something to remember 'er by,"

He looked up at Fleur and shook his head, "No. Leave it. I'll never give it to anyone else,"

"She wouldn't want you to be alone," Harry said.

"There's no one else,"

He knew that in time, people would tell him that he was young. He still had his life ahead of him. He could still find someone and fall in love again. But he knew that there would never be anybody like Lydia. There would never be anyone who would understand him like Lydia. She was the first person, outside of Fred, who believed in the joke shop and told him to go for it. She was unlike anyone he had ever met, and he would never meet another Lydia. There was no other Lydia.

"There isn't!" He said, when Fleur was looking at him funnily.

"I know," she said in a soothing tone, "I know,"

George did not go back to The Burrow, or even Shell Cottage. Harry suggested that he could come back to James' apartment, where they were going, but he declined. He needed to be alone for a while. He needed to work things through. No one seemed particularly thrilled about him going back to the flat that he and Fred had shared, but no one seemed to have the energy to argue back. George didn't have the energy to do much but curl up in a ball and cry.

"I'll come and see you soon, mate," Charlie whispered, patting him on the back before he late.

"Yeah, yeah...cheers,"

He walked to Hogsmeade and Apparated home. Being away from Hogwarts and back in Diagon Alley felt wrong. The air smelled too clean and the sounds of birds chirping made him uncomfortable. He could not understand how a sound so sweet could be heard on a day like today. For the first time, he glanced at his watch and it told him that it was 6 in the morning. Usually, he and Fred would be waking up around this time to get the shop ready for what was always promised to be a busy day. He would probably write back to Lydia, go through bills that gave him a headache and then drink two too many cups of coffee in a desperate attempt to wake himself up.

And now he would never do that again.

Diagon Alley was deserted except for the beggars that sat in the doorways. Immediately, George's hand went to his pocket to give them some money, but he remembered that he didn't have any on him and that somehow made him feel worse. As he walked towards the shop, he glanced over at Gringotts and felt a small smile creep onto his face. He did not understand how Lydia and the others had managed to break out of the bank without being caught and he turned around to ask her, but then he remembered what had happened. The realisation that he would never hear her tell that story hit him like a tonne of drinks and he had to lean against a wall to stop himself from collapsing. Watching Lydia tell stories was one of his favourite things in the world; her eyes would always been shining and she would be gesticulating so violently that anyone who was sat near her would have to keep on ducking out of the way so not to be hit in the face. She had once accidentally punched Ron in the face when she was telling the story of how she and Harry had snuck in and out of Hogsmeade in their third year.

"Sir, are you OK?"

George turned around to someone wearing Healer robes looking at him anxiously.

"Fine," he muttered.

The Healer looked at him closely, "You've been at Hogwarts, haven't you?"

George raised his eyebrows at him, "you've heard?"

"Hard not to..." He said, "Do...do you need anything?"

"My brother and my fiancé back from the dead. Can you do that?"

"No,"

"Then I don't need anything," George shrugged.

"Is it true?" The Healer asked, when George turned his back on him, "Is it true that Lydia Potter is dead?"

George froze and suddenly felt like someone had punched him in the stomach and he could not bring himself to turn around. News really did travel fast in the Wizarding world.

"Lydia Potter is dead," he said, still not turning around.

And saying those words out loud, speaking them into existence was unlike any pain that George had ever experienced. It was nothing compared to being hit in the face with a Bludger, it wasn't even anything like being tortured with the Cruciatus Curse. It was something much deeper and nothing that he would ever be able to describe, so he did not try to describe it. He just carried on walking home, because what else could he do but carry on?


	2. Mischief Managed

George sat cross legged in the middle of his bed and stared down at the Pygmy Puff in his hands, tears streaming down his face. He remembered Fred coming up with the idea of Pygmy Puffs in the first place and then Lydia giggling when he handed Fabio over to her for the first time. That seemed like such a long time ago. The world had been scary and dark then, and they were apparantley living in better times. According to the Daily Prophet, everything was suddenly better. But it wasn't. How could it be? How could it be better when he was attending his brothers funeral that afternoon, and his Fiancé's the next day? How was that a better world?

There was a gentle knock on the door and Ginny stuck her head in. Her eyes seemed to be in a permanent state of puffiness from crying and George felt like the worst older brother in the world; there was nothing he could say to make her feel better. He wasn't even sure that he would ever feel better about anything again.

"Mum said you can come and see him. Before they shut the coffin," she said, her voice barely above a whisper.

He nodded and placed Fabio on his shoulder, "Have you seen him?"

She shook her head, "I c-can't,"

George held his hand out to her and she took it, "Come on. We'll go and see him together. It's always easier that way,"

"Nothing's going to make this easier,"

Downstairs they hesitantly approached the coffin, unsure of what to expect. He looked a lot better than he had done on the night of the Battle. He looked quite peaceful, George though. Any injuries that he had sustained had either been healed or hidden with his robes, with the exception of a cut that ran underneath his jaw. Fred had gotten worse injuries from Quidditch matches. Next to him, Ginny gave a small sob and George remembered that his twin was actually dead. Charlie walked up behind them and put his arm around Ginny who quickly left the room.

"You alright, mate?" Charlie asked him.

"I've felt better," George said, trying to keep his voice light.

What he really wanted to say was that he didn't want to be alive anymore. The moe he thought about, the more pointless that it seemed. What did he have if he didn't have Fred or Lydia? And what was one more fatality going to change? The war had already been won, so it wasn't as though they were short on soldiers. His death would actually be very inconsequential. The Prophet were not focusing on anything depressing these days, it was all about hope. How Lydia Potter had sacrificed everything in the name of hope. How Harry Potter was providing them with hope by carrying on. If George were to drop dead there and then, they would not report on it and it would not effect the lives of anyone. Maybe it was for the best.

Charlie nudged him, "You can sit today out,"

"What kind of twin would I be then?" George asked.

Ten minutes later, the coffin was shut and people took their seats. George carried the coffin with Bill, Charlie, Ron, Arthur and Percy. He could not bare to look around at those gathered and instead stared straight ahead, focusing on an gnome in the distance. Tears sprang to his eyes again as he remembered he and Fred stupefiying a gnome to be the Angel on the Christmas tree. Christmas that year would be so difficult for everyone, he wasn't sure what he was going to do to celebrate. He wasn't even sure that he would be able to celebrate.

"And now, a few words from Fred's twin, George," the minister said after he had briefly spoken about Fred himself.

"Well, the good news is, is that people will be able to tell the difference between me and Fred now. The only problem is that I wish people couldn't," George said, "because most of my humour is based around being a twin...and I really miss him. I really, really do and I don't really know what I'm meant to do without him at this point," he paused for a moment, biting his lip.

"Fred was always louder than me. He wasn't ever afraid to put himself out there and usually was the one to tell me that it didn't really matter how illegal our pranks were, because the funniness of them would cancel the illegality of them out," he gave a feeble chuckle, "I always knew that that wasn't true but I thought, if I'm going to Azkaban, I'd rather go with him..." He looked up at the congregation, "and there's days when I'd rather go with him now, wherever he is,"

George glanced up at the sky, imagining him for a moment, "Fred was never scared of dying. Anyone who went to Hogwarts with him knows that he would do anything if it was a good laugh, much to the annoyance of poor Professor McGonagall who I'm sure would dread our Transfiguration lessons," there was a few laughs, "No, Fred was afraid of not living. He was afraid of an office job and it's mundane realities. And I think it's safe to say that Fred lived and did everything that he wanted to do. I just don't think that he would have wanted to leave us behind because I'm afraid of living without him. He was born first and I have never known a world without him until now. And it's that little bit darker and there's not nearly as much laughter, but it doesn't have to stay that way. I don't want it to stay that way because Fred wouldn't have wanted us all to be moping around, though he would have loved all the attention," he wiped his eyes, "so, I think, really, we should just try and have as much fun as possible tonight, because it is what we would have wanted. And, Freddie, if you're looking down on us, and I'm sure you are, I miss you, mate, I really do. And thank-you, for being the best brother and for occasionally taking detentions for me,"

He rolled up the parchment and walked back to the seat, his hand brushing the coffin as he went. Bill made a speech before the actual burial and then they watched in a heartbreaking silence as the coffin was lowered into the ground and the grave was closed up. The mourners slowly began to make their way back over to The Burrow and he walked over to the headstone.

"Lydia, can you stay with me a minute?" George said staring down at the headstone. When she did not reply he glanced around looking for her and then he remembered what had happened.

"Great job, Georgie, you can't even remember who's dead..." he muttered to himself.

At the bottom of the headstone, the words "Mischief Managed," were engraved. George felt himself smile at the words. It was a nice touch.

Someone walked up behind him and gently touched him on the shoulder. He looked around and was shocked to see Draco Malfoy. He had not seen him since the Battle of Hogwarts. He looked as terrible as she felt.

"Draco," he said, "I-I didn't think you'd come,"

"I've not felt very welcome at the other funerals," he said, "but I thought I should come and pay my respects to Fred,"

George smiled at him and nodded his head, "So, what are your plans for the future?"

"I don't have any. I'm being put on trial for my connection to the Death Eaters. I don't actually think I have a future," Draco sighed.

"That's not fair," George said quietly.

"Nothing is," he sighed, "I'm going to come to Lydia's funeral. If...if that's alright,"

"Of course it's alright," George said, "I think she'd be pretty pissed off if you didn't,"

Draco laughed and wiped the tears from his eyes, "Yeah. She'd probably try and curse me...anyway, I'll see you around,"

"See you, Draco,"

How long he stayed knelt at Fred's grave he was not sure, but it was much easier than having to face his family. It was much easier than having to face Harry. George knew that he would not be able to avoid him forever, but he reminded him too much of Lydia. The eyes, the hair, the glasses...everything. He also didn't know how to speak to him. He had no idea what to say to the Boy who Lived, or the Boy who Lost Everything as the Daily Prophet were now referring to him as. Finally, George pushed himself off the ground and slowly walked back towards the house, wondering how on earth he would get through Lydia's funeral.

"Ready?" Lee asked.

George turned around to face Lee. He considered lying to him first and saying that he was ready, but there was no point in lying to Lee. If he could be himself in front of anyone, it was his best friend.

"I'm whatever the exact opposite of ready is," George said, "I - I just want her back. I want them both back. I want a second chance to say g-goody-bye, but properly,"

"This is your chance," Lee said quietly.

"Pretty shitty though, isn't it?"

"Oh, Merlin, yes, it's the worse,"

Feeling as though he could not breathe, he Apparated to Godric's Hollow and immediately wanted to go back home. This is where the Girl who Lived had come to be, and this would be where she would be laid to rest. George looked around as they slowly walked to the cemetery. The quaint cottages looked like the type of place that he might have liked to live in with Lydia. A young couple walked past them hand-in-hand and George felt the sudden urge to shout at them out of a disgusting jealous spite that was brewing inside of him. Why was it that people were so in love? Why was it that people were fortunate enough to be in love with someone who was still alive? Why could he not be that lucky? Why was he in love with someone who would never walk the earth again?

When they got to the cemetery, the first person that George saw was Harry and he immediately hurried away from him. Hurrying away from Harry only meant that he ran into a group of people he really didn't want to see, The Dursleys. Rage rushed through his body as he looked at them. Why did they think they had the right to be here? After the way that they had treated her and Harry for all those years?

"The Dursleys..." George muttered, barely able to string a sentence together, "The Dursleys they're...they're actually here,"

"Leave them, George," Lee said quietly, tugging on his arm.

"She'd want me to punch them,"

"You can't go around punching Muggles, George, no matter how much of a twat they are,"

Lee dragged him to the very back of the congregation and away from the Dursleys. George tried his best to stay out of sight, but it did not quite work out in his favour for Hermione saw him hovering near the back and grabbed his hand, pulling him to the front row.

"You're family. You should be at the front," she whispered through her sobs.

He could not quite believe how many people had come to say good-bye to her. Though he supposed that she was quite a big deal, these days. When he saw the Daily Prophet reporters, he felt a sudden rush of anger towards them; how many of these people had made fun of Lydia and Harry when they said that Lord Voldemort was back? How many of these people had peddled the rumours that she was a Dark Witch and not to be trusted? And now they had the nerve to attend her funeral and cry tears for a girl that they never gave a shit about in the first place. The only thing more insulting would be if Dolores Umbridge herself turned up at the funeral.

George sat at the end of the row and as far away from Harry as he possibly could, and then made the quite significant mistake of looking up at the graves. After James' death, Narcissa had ordered that he be buried with his wife. How she did this without Lord Voldemort finding out he did not know, nor did he care enough to find out. He was just happy that James had been able to have a dignified burial, as he deserved. But seeing Lydia's name engraved on th headstone was perhaps one of the worst sights in the world and it evoked the kind of pain that no Cruciatius Curse would ever be able to achieve.

 ** _James Potter_**

 ** _March 27th 1960 - October 31st 1981_**

 ** _June 24th 1995 - April 13th 1998_**

 ** _Lily potter_**

 ** _January 30th 1960 - October 31st 1981_**

 ** _Lydia Potter_**

 ** _July 31st 1980 - May 2nd 1998_**

 ** _The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death._**

"So young..." Lee whispered, "All of them...so young..."

"Too young..." George said.

"We are gathered here today to celebrate the life of Lydia Lily Potter," the wizard who had done Fred's funeral was speaking and Goerge forced himself to listen. For her. "Known to the public as The Girl who Lived, but known to those closet as 'Lyds,'. A beloved sister, fierce friend and loving Fiancé, there is no filling the hole that has been left by her death," George felt as though this was an understatement. "She was intelligent, funny, strong and, above all, brave,"

George scoffed. He had no idea what the extent of her bravery really was. He thought that perhaps most people sat around did not actually know how brave she was. Maybe he didn't even understand how courageous she was, especially in her last minutes of life. Not for the first time, George wondered how she must have felt walking to her death. He wondered if she made peace with it quickly, or if she tried to think of a way out. He knew that she would not have cried when she faced Voldemort. She did not like crying in front of people, and Lord Voldemort would be no exception to this. For a moment, he could envision her facing him; back straight, head held high and wand stuck firmly in her hair, waiting. And he knew that she would not have closed her eyes or looked away from the Dark Lord. No, she would have stared him dead in the face, as though daring him to do it.

So lost in his thoughts, George did not even realise that the wizard had stopped talking and was stood to the side so that Professor McGonagall could make her eulogy. George had been asked if he wanted to speak, and he had never said no to something so quickly in his life. There was no amount of words in the English language that could put together how he felt. He still did not understand how he found the words to say what he felt about Fred. Perhaps that was just a twin thing.

"The first time I met Lydia was a week after she and her brother were born. And the next time I saw her was after the fateful Halloween night, and I knew that the next time I saw them, they would not at all be the children that Lily and James would have brought them up to be, but they were OK. I knew that they would be safe at Hogwarts. Or...I thought they would be.

"Although Lydia was never actually in Gryffindor, she did become an honorary Gryffindor. So much so that sometimes I forgot she was not in my house and often gave house points to Gryffindor when I should have given them to Slytherin. She only started correcting me in her third year. Though, sometimes, I'm sure she let me take house points off Gryffindor instead of Slytherin,"

George smiled slightly. He could think of a large number of times when Lydia had allowed Gryffindor to lose house points instead of Slytherin when she had broken the rules. " _All's fair in love and war, Georgie,"_ she would say whenever he tried to point out that Gryffindor had just needlessly lost ten house points.

"Anyone who knew Lydia knew that she was not your average girl. Even from a young age she harboured a defiance that I had only ever seen before in her mother. In fact, one of my clearest memories of the two of them are almost the same memory. I remember an eleven year old Lily Evans turning up to a Quidditch match with Slytherin colours painted on her cheeks, and Lydia turning up to one with Gryffindor colours painted on her cheeks," Professor McGonagall smiled and then shook her head, "If we were all a little more like Lydia Potter, then maybe the world wouldn't be so bad. Rest easy, Miss Potter,"

George did not join in with the applause. Everything was becoming too much and he suddenly wished that he was buried beneath the ground with her.

"Finally, Lydia's twin brother, Harry, will say a few words,"

"I'm dreading this..." Lee muttered, and George had never agreed with something that he said more.

George forced himself to look up at Harry, who looked nothing short of broken, "For the longest time, the only person I had was Lydia. W-We didn't have a lot growing up. We didn't have anything...we didn't have anything bout each other. And now that I don't even have her, I don't actually know what I'm going to do. We were always aware hat there was every chance that we would never come out of this alive, but - but I never thought about it. I never wanted to t-think about a world where my sister wasn't alive,"

Emotions overtook him and George looked at his hands, allowing himself to cry quietly whilst put his arm around his shoulder.

"I could go on and on about how brave and kind and funny Lydia was, but what would be the point in that? Everyone already knows all these things about her. You knew it every time you had a conversation with her. My favourite thing about her was how she stood up for people, all the time. She once cursed someone because they said something 'vaguely mean' about me and...that's just the kind of person she was.

"But, since I'm her brother, I think I'm allowed to talk about the moments in her life when she wasn't that amazing. Like the time she accidentally on purpose distentegrated an entire row of desks in Potions and just turned to me and said, "do you think we're going to get dentition for this?". And for he record, we both spent three weeks in detention and she still stands - sorry, she stood by the fact that it was an overreaction on Professor Snape's part. Hermione still says that it's her own fault for throwing two fireworks into the cauldron when one would have been more than enough,"

George laughed quietly, he could think of many times when things didn't quite work out in the way she had hoped they would.

 _"George! George! George! Help! I've messed up! I've messed up!"_

 _He whirled around just as Lydia came sprinting down the corridor towards him. She grabbed his hand and pulled him after her, shoving him behind a tapestry._

 _"If you just want a snog, you can just-"_

 _"Not now!" She hissed, "I really, really messed up. You know that box of Dungbombs you put in my bag so Filch wouldn't find them?"_

 _"Yes,"_

 _"Well, I tripped up outside his office - completely on accident, I wasn't looking where I was going - and they all rolled out of my bag and set off," Lydia told him, "and then I heard him moving around in his office so I just bolted and-"_

 _"Potter! I know you're behind there!" Came Filch's voice._

 _Lydia groaned and rested her head against his shoulder, "This...this is the worst day. I've already got detention with Umbridge tonight,"_

 _"I will be the most heroic person in the world and take this for you," he said, "because I love you,"_

 _""Y-you...you love me?" Lydia said, her eyes wide._

 _George inwardly groaned, "I mean - you know - it's, uh, bit of a weird time to say it for the first time but - you know, if you don't - completely fine-"_

 _"Shut up. I love you,"_

 _He was so happy that he barely took any notice of Filch screaming at him._

"And...one would have been more than enough," Harry said. George looked up again, he had completely zoned out and wasn't entirely sure what Harry was talking about, "And one more day with her would have been more than enough. Because...because there's things I need to tell her. It's stupid because I never realised that sometimes I'd just speak to her about stupid stuff. It wasn't all Horcruxes and Lord Voldemort, sometimes we'd just talk about what we wanted to eat for breakfast or how tired we were. Just this morning, I woke up and I was going to ask her if she wanted to g-go to the Leaky Cauldron for s-something to eat, but then I remembered that she isn't here anymore.

"Anyway, there's not point in getting worked up over this because...well, because we can't change what happened, I guess. What we can do though, is make sure that this never happens again. We can make sure that no one ever has to go through what Lydia had to ever again. And we carry on, for Lydia,"

George closed his eyes as the coffin was lowered into the ground. It was perhaps the last thing that he wanted to see. The only thing that he wanted to see what Lydia, but he supposed that that was impossible now. As the crowd began to disperse, George slowly made his way over to the headstone where Harry was stood, his head bowed.

"She's really gone..." George whispered.

Harry turned around but did not say anything. George did not really want him to.

"I'm sorry, Harry," she said, "losing a twin, it's tough...anyway, I'll see you around,"

"Yeah. See you, George,"

Whilst Lee was talking to Oliver Wood, George took the chance to wander around Godric's Hollow on his own. Hands shoved deep in his pockets, he kept he tried to take in as much of the village as he could. Somehow, he felt as though it brought him closer to Lydia even though she had never been further away. He came to the square and stopped dead in his tracks as a statue came into view. At first, he thought that it was just a muggle war memorial, but then he realised that it was a statue of the Potter family. A baby Lydia sat in the arms of James, whilst Lily held onto Harry. George became quite transfixed, looking up at the Potter family. Long ago, they were an actual family and now, only one of them was left...

"Strange, isn't it?" a voice behind him said.

He turned around to see Daphne Greengrass walking towards him, her arms tightly folded as she looked up at the statue.

"My parents brought my sister and I to see this when we were younger," she continued, "and they said even though we're Pureblood, that's not the most important thing about us, and we don't let it become the most important thing about us because if we did, that would be an insult to the Potters," she sighed, "and then when I was at school, I let it define me and I was terrible. I should have been friends with Lydia sooner,"

"You can't get upset about something you can't change," George said, "and you were always on the right side,"

"Not like Lydia, though," Daphne said, "Not that anyone can be like her, anyway. She was one of a kind..."

"Yeah..." George whispered.

"I'm really sorry you lost her, George," Daphne said, placing her hand on his shoulder, "It's not fair. None of this is fair,"

"It's reality though, isn't it?"

He smiled at her and carried on walking, feeling worse and worse. He wasn't sure that his life could get any worse than it already was, but it wouldn't be surprising if he did. The shop could go out of business, The Burrow could burn down, the very world could come to an end and it wouldn't bother him. It'd probably feel right, if anything. He wasn't sure he was made to live a happy life.

George suddenly found himself at a dead end and went to turn around to re-join the funeral, but then his eyes fell on a cottage at the bottom of a cul-de-sac. At first, he thought that it was just another cottage like all the others, but the more he looked at it, the more he realised that it wasn't any old cottage. The breath catching in his throat, George moved towards the shattered remains of the Potter house. The top of the house had been completely destroyed by the killing curse that had rebounded on Lord Voldemort and one of the wooden beams was swaying slightly in the light summer breeze, holding on by just a splinter. In all the time that George had known Harry and Lydia, he had never once thought about what had happened to the Potter house. He supposed that no one would have wanted to move in after everything that had happened true, perhaps he had thought that it had just been destroyed years ago.

Slowly, he placed his hand on the gate, contemplating whether or not he should go in. It didn't look particularly stable, but it must have been magically re-enforced for it to stay up as long as he had. His attention was drawn away from the house when a sign rose from the ground. He bent closer to read what was written on it, _"On this spot on the night of 31st October 1981, Lily and James Potter lost their lives. Their children, Harry and Lydia, remain the only wizards to have ever survived the Killing Curse. This house, invisible to Muggles, has been left in its ruined state as a monument to the Potters and as a reminder of the violence that tore their family apart,"._ But this did not interest him for he already knew what had happened. No, the thing that he found most interesting was what had been written around it. Clearly, thousands of Witches and Wizards had travelled to this place to pay tribute to the Children who Lived - _"Good luck, Harry and Lydia, wherever you are!" - "If you ever read this, Harry and Lydia, we're all behind you!" - "Long live Harry and Lydia Potter!"._

The most recent ones, however, stood out amongst the others. _"Rest in peace, Lydia Potter!" - "Long live the memory of Lydia Potter!" - "Thank-you for everything, Lydia!" a_ nd _"Lydia, I hope you have finally found peace,"._ George stood and stared at the messages for a while, tears brimming in his eyes. He wondered if he should write something for her but could not think of anything to say, so he turned on his heel and walked away, his head bowed.


	3. Love Is Stronger Than Death

A whole year had passed without them, and it was still no easier. George could not understand how people could walk around and say that things had gotten better since the war had ended, because that was not the case. Things had gotten harder. When Percy and his girlfriend had moved in together, he couldn't help but think about how that should have been him and Lydia moving in together. When Lee had began working at the shop so that he could take a year off to wrap his head around everything, he couldn't help but think about how Lee shouldn't have had to start working at the shop because Fred shouldn't be dead. Fred should still be working on the shop floor whilst George and Lydia went flat hunting and everything should be exactly as it was.

His alarm went off and he flicked his wand at it, silencing it. This was the day that he had been dreading more than any other day. George squeezed his eyes shut again and tried to remember exactly what he had been doing this time last year. He could not remember. All he knew was that Fred and Lydia had been alive and he was still full of hope that a new dawn would rise and with it, a better world. He lay in bed and tried to think of the things had changed for the better; there was no more Voldemort and no more Death Eaters. The Ministry was no longer corrupt and hate crimes against those who were of muggle parentage had hit a new low. And yet the world still let that little bit more dark. It was as though the sun had gone behind the clouds and was refusing to come out again. George almost wished that he could o whine the clouds and not come out again.

There was a pecking on the window and he glanced over at it. It was an owl with morning paper. He didn't know why he still got the Daily Prophet, he never read them. There was a towering pile of them beneath the window where he would drop them every morning. It was probably a waste of money but he suddenly had money that he could waste. That morning was different, however, for the reason that his face was plastered across the front page of the paper along with Lydia, Harry and James. It was a picture from the Christmas that they had spent at The Burrow.

THE BATTLE OF HOGWARTS, ONE YEAR ON;

THE HEARTBREAK OF LYDIA POTTERS FIANCE 

AND HER BROTHER, 

THE BOY WHO LOST EVERYTHING

It is hard to believe that the Battle of Hogwarts took place just one year ago. Most can remember it as clear as anything. I remember hearing the first repost of something happening at the school when I was at the office. When the whole story came through, I was in a state of shock. It was all going to come to an end in a matter hours, but nothing could prepare any of the Wizarding community for what really happened that night, for what we lost.

Fifty people, some students, some teachers and some members of the Order of the Phoenix died that night. Including The Girl who Lived, Lydia Potter. She is survived by her twin brother, Harry Potter, and her Fiancé, George Weasley, who also lost his own twin brother, Fred, in the battle that night. As you may recall, her death was shrouded in musters for some time until acting Minister for Magic, Kingsley Shacklebolt, released a statement to the press, explaining what had happened.

"Lord Voldemort created dark objects known as Horcruxes that contained a piece of his should. Harry and Lydia Potter, along with their friends Ronald Weasley and Hermione Granger, set of to destroy these Horcruxes so that Lord Voldemort himself could be killed. What they were not aware of, however, was that Lydia Potter contained a piece of Lord Voldemort's soul. And the only way that the world could ever be rid of the Dark Lord once and for all, was if every piece of his soul was destroyed, including the piece that lived within Lydia. She sacrificed herself so that we can live in a better world,"

The statement came as a shock to many of us. After all, Lydia Potter had been walking around with a piece of the soul of the Darkest Wizard to ever threaten our community. She attended Hogwarts School and mixed, I am sure, with the children of many of those reading this paper. Which just begs the question - was Lydia Potter all that good and are we better off without her? Now, my dear readers, we will, of course, forever be indebted to Lydia Potter and the sacrifice that she made for us, but that does not mean that she was a good person - she could have been the next Lord Voldemort had she not been killed.

I do hear you ask how on earth I could have come to the conclusion that Lydia Potter was on course to becoming the next Lord Voldemort but the signs, if you look closely enough, are all there. First of all, she was sorted into Slytherin house. This, I am sure, raised a fair few eyebrows in school. How could someone who vanquished the Dark Lord be put in the very house that created him? Think about all the Darkest wizards of our time and ask yourself this - what house did they all come from? Because it was not Gryffindor. So really, it would not at all be surprising if Lydia had ended up being pushed down the wrong path.

Now, if even this does not convince you, I'm sure this will - Lydia Potter had the ability to speak to snakes. Something that both Salazar Slytherin and Lord Voldemort had the ability to do. Dear readers, how many good wizards do you know who could speak to snakes? I'll save you your thinking time - none.

I could even tell you about all the Dark Magic that she used in her lifetime but that would ruin my newest book that I am most exciting to announce is being published on July 31st of next year! 'LYDIA POTTER AND THE DARKNESS WITHIN,'.

Of course, regardless of whether Lydia Potter was a dark witch, there are still those who miss her; her brother delivered a truly heartbreaking eulogy at her funeral (see pages 3 and 4 for a recap) and her Fiancé, George Weasley, has not been seen since her funeral. He is no longer working at the shop that he opened with his twin brother and, when I asked the new shop manager, he responded with a sentence that I could never publish in a paper such as this one.

A memorial service is being held at Hogwarts School today in rememberance of those who fought for us.

George screwed the paper up and chucked it out of the window, seething with rage. He had not even had to look at the byline to know who had written it. There was only one journalist in the whole world who could have written something so cruel and insensitive on a day like today. Rita Skeeter seemed unable to say anything even slightly nice about Lydia. He could not understand why she had been so hellbent on painting Lydia as a bad person since she was fourteen. He didn't understand how Skeeter still had a job and a massive column in the Prophet. Least of all, however, he did not understand how someone could die so that the world might one day be a better place and have their name dragged through the mud.

"I don't know why you're so bothered about it." Lydia said indifferently, dropping the paper to the side. Her face with the words, "THE EVIL POTTER TWIN," were plastered on the front page.

"Because you're not evil!" George exclaimed, kicking the paper away from them and watching as a group of Hufflepuffs trampled over it.

"You're just bitter because she thought I was going out with Fred and not you!" Lydia laughed, "it doesn't matter, anyway. I just want to focus on not dying in the third task,"

"I'll focus on how much of a dickhead that Rita Skeeter is then,"

"Great! We're both doing two very important things!"

George wiped his eyes and stormed into the bathroom, trying to calm himself down. What Rita Skeeter says doesn't matter, he thought to himself, you know what she was really like. You know that she wasn't a Dark Witch. She was your Fiance. She was funny and bright and probably one of the best thing that had ever happened to him. If she were here and had read that article, she probably would have just rolled her eyes and said that Skeeter was full of shit.

Fred would have managed to make a joke about the whole thing, like he did when everyone thought that she was Slytherin's heir when the Chamber of Secrets had been opened. Suddenly unable to stand, George sank to the floor and allowed himself to sob. He missed Fred. If Fred had survived, he would have been able to make a joke about the article. He would have been able to pull George out of his darkest moments, because he was always able to make George feel like the entire world wasn't falling apart around him, even when it actually was.

"George, why are you awake?"

He looked over at Fred. They were in hiding at Great Aunt Muriel's and it was perhaps the most depressing place in the world, he even felt like that after staying at Malfoy Manor for so long. Aunt Muriel was annoying and everyone's constant worrying about him was a whole different type of stress. His mum burst into tears every time she saw him and his dad kept on asking if he was OK. No matter how many times he assured his family that he was OK, they never seemed to believe him.

"Can't sleep," George replied.

"Oh, fun. Neither can I,"

George rolled his eyes, "That's a lie,"

"I'm worried about you, mate," Fred said, sitting next to him.

"I don't want to talk about Malfoy Manor," George snapped.

"I wasn't talking about that," Fred said lightly, "I'm just worried that Lydia will kill you if you lose another ear before the wedding,"

It took George a while to get off the floor and even longer while to get ready. His skin was terribly pale, the bags under his eyes were something quite atrocious and he had let his hair grow longer than he should have done. He imagined that Lydia would have probably told him to cut it before they got married and that upset him even more. He decided that when he started looking like Bill, he would cut it. Just because one of his brothers looked good with, didn't mean that he would look good with long hair. Not that looking good matter anymore. Nothing matter anymore.

"Yeah," he said, speaking out loud, "I'm not going,"

He walked back into the living room and dropped onto the couch. He reached for some floo powder, planning on floo'ing his parents to tell him that he wasn't going but stopped himself. Conversations with his family had changed since Fred and Lydia died. There was a time when he used to be able to talk to them about anything, and would look forward to going round to see them, but he started to dread them and then stopped going completely. At first, Hermione had tried to convince him to go round with her, Ron and Harry, but after saying no so many times, even she had left him alone.

There was a knock on the door, and George ignored it. He had once made the mistake of opening the door only to find that it was intrusive Daily Prophet reporters asking him about his feelings. Turning up on the anniversary, of all days, felt insanely intrusive, but George was no longer surprised by the way that Daily Prophet reporters conducted themselves. He had long since decided that the only quality needed in a Daily Prophet reporter was to be a humungous dickhead.

The knocking persisted and George lay down, holding a cushion over his head and trying to block the sound out. They would get bored eventually, they always did. Five minutes passed, and they did not stop knocking. Furious, George leapt off the couch and stomped over to his front door, yanking the door open.

"Listen, I don't want to talk about shitty my life is, so if you could just fuck - oh..." he trailed off as his eyes fell on Ron, Harry and Hermione, "Oh...hi. Aren't you...aren't you meant to be at school?"

"We are," Hermione said bracingly, "and so are you!"

"I left school ages ago, Hermione, you know that," George said, forcing a smile onto his face, "Remember? It was actually quite dramatic-"

"Shut up," Ron advised, "We thought you wouldn't turn up, so we're forcing you out," he smiled at him and then pushed back, "You couldn't do us some breakfast could you, Georgie? I'm starving,"

George stood where he was at the door as the three of them barged past and walked into the flat. Harry had barely looked at him, and it made him uncomfortable. Not that George had anything to say to Harry. They had both lost too much, too soon and acknowledging anything that they had lost would not go very well. Harry also looked too much like Lydia and just looking at him was painful.

"You can make yourself some breakfast," George muttered, "I'm not your personal chef,"

"You're a shit host," Ron said, flicking his wand at the kettle, "Are you OK, though?"

"What do you think, Ron?"

"Thought so," Ron sighed. Suddenly, there were tears in his eyes, "Ah, for fucks sake, I'm fed up of crying!"

"Better out than in," Hermione said.

"'Mione, please, for the love of God, stop saying that," Harry said moodily from the couch, "It doesn't help,"

Hermione stared at the back of Harry's head for a while and then sighed, brushing the top of his head with her hand, "I know," she said quietly. She turned to look at George and her expression turned stony, "Your hair is terrible,"

George blinked at her, "I've had bigger things to worry about, Hermione,"

"There's no excuse to have hair like that," she said, grabbing his arm and pulling him in the bathroom, "I'm cutting it,"

"Wait! Hermione - you can't just - hey!"

His protests fell on deaf ears, ten minutes later he walked back into the kitchen with much shorter hair than had woken up with that morning. When he had looked in the mirror, the first he thought was how much better it looked, but he was not about to say that outloud. Especially not to Hermione.

Going back to Hogwarts was as depressing as George had thought it would be. The moment he walked through the gates, he was transported back to that night. He could still hear the sounds of duelling and the strange smell that hung in the air. He could still see Voldemort's face, Fred's body and the sight of Hagrid carrying Lydia out of the Forest. George almost froze in his tracks when he realised that he had not spoken to Hagrid since that night. He probably should, but he had no idea what he was meant to say to him. He had no idea what he was meant to say to anyone anymore.

They walked up the steps of the Entrance Hall and George glanced around. The castle looked the exact same as it had since the Battle, and yet felt so different. A strange tension hung in the air and those that were gathered in the Hall stuck close together and spoke in whispers, as though they were at a funeral parlour. George glanced over at the doors to the dungeons and then quickly looked away, all he could think about was how often he had stood in this exact spot, waiting for Lydia, and how he would never wait for her again. It almost made him angry at how annoyed he used to get at her for taking so long to get ready.

"Alright, mate?"

George tore his eyes away from the dungeons and turned around to see Charlie stood besides him, his hands deep in his pockets.

"Nope," George said, "Are you?"

"I'm the exact opposite of fine, funnily enough," Charlie sighed.

After awkwardly and tearfully greeting his family, George followed his family out to the lake where chairs were set up like they had been on the day of Dumbledore's funeral. He glanced over at the Forest and immediately looked away again. The last thing he needed was to look over there and to be reminded of what he had lost, of what they had all lost.

He took his seat in the second row and was sat directly behind Harry, who was slumped forwards in his seat, sobbing. Tears sprang to George's eyes and he looked away from Harry, only to see something even worse. Someone, and George had a distinct feeling that it was Luna, had constructed some sort of memorial. It was a wall of flowers and, within them, were paintings of those who died at the Battle of Hogwarts, though they were not magical portraits and did not move. George quickly scanned it, tears now streaming down his face. The painting of Lydia was in the very middle, smiling somewhat sheepishly at them. Somehow, Luna had captured her eyes perfectly and George was half expecting her to blink. Above Lydia, was Fred, smirking as he always did. The portraits of Remus and Tonks were side by side and, beneath them, was a beaming Colin Creevey next to Professor Babbling and Lavender Brown. At the very top of the piece, Luna had neatly written, "Love is stronger than death," and George could no longer look.

He did his best to listen what Kingsley and Professor McGonagall were saying when they made their speeches, but the sounds of quiet sobbing around him were proving to be too distracting. At the end of the row, Ginny jumped up and walked away. George knew that he should probably go after her, but knew that he would not be able to and let Percy rush after her instead.

"My name is Hermione Granger, and I'm a Mudblood,"

George's head snapped up and he looked to the front where Hermione was stood, a smile playing on his lips. Only Hermione Granger would choose this moment to make a political statement, and he was glad that she had done. He wasn't sure that he would have been able to deal with anymore people talking about how brave those who had died at the Battle were.

"From the moment I stepped foot in the Wizarding World, that was the name that attached itself to me and there was nothing I could do to get away from it. When Lord Voldemort came out of hiding at the end of my fifth year, it was a year I heard more and more. It followed me through the halls of Hogwarts as I tried to study for my NEWTs, like a ghost that had latched itself onto me. But I ignored it. I said that I would never let it define me. I am more than a Muggleborn. I'm a daughter, a friend - a best friend, a girlfriend and a witch.

"And yet, as my sixth year drew to a close, and the war was truly upon us, I realised that I was a Muggleborn first, and that everything else came last.The Ministry were rounding us up like animals and I had to go into hiding. I had to send my parents away and pray that the war would end before someone could find them.

"I went on the run, desperate to save a world that didn't really care about me, and we did," Hermione, a proud note in her voice. "I watched my two best friends save the Wizarding World and - and..." She took a deep, shuddering breath, "I watched the first friend I ever had be carried out of the Forbidden Forest after she died for us. And then we all had to pretend that everything was OK. We all had to pretend that a seventeen year old girl dying for us is normal and that injustice no longer exists. But the sad truth is, is that it does. It's not gone away. In a year, we've made absolutely not progress.

"Still, the world Mudblood follows me around. It was used against me then, and it's used against me now. Fifty people died on this day one year ago in the hopes of a better tomorrow. Some of them were Mudbloods like me. If you want to hour their memories properly, then you start at the very basic level of treating people equally, because when you don't, you carry on the legacy of Lord Voldemort and his Death Eaters. The only legacies we should be carrying are the likes of Colin Creevey and Professor Babbling, two Mudbloods who died protecting this castle.

"You carry on the legacy of Lydia Potter. Lydia Potter, a Half-blood who rejected the beliefs of many of her fellow Slytherins and befriended a Mudblood and treated me like my family. Who could have spent her Christmas holidays with a pureblood family, but chose to spend them with the biggest blood-traitor family around," she looked up at the crowd and fire seemed to flash through her eyes, "No more blood supremacy, no more fighting. If love won us this war, it can carry us on for the rest of time,"

As the crowd erupted with applause, George took the chance to sneak away. Everyone was too distracted by Hermione to see him go. The entire thing was getting too much for him and all he wanted was to be alone. He knew that isolating himself from his family was not getting him anywhere, but sitting with them was too painful. The fact that none of them could look him full in the face because he looked like Fred made him feel worse, and he didn't even think that he could feel worse than he already did.

Without even realising it, he was in the forest and, even stranger, was in some sort of clearing. The trees around him were dead and decaying, and the ground was scorched as though by fire. At first, he could not understand where he was or why this part of the forest looked so different from the rest, but then it hit him.

This is where it had happened.

On this day, exactly one year ago, Lydia Potter had walked to her death. Goosebumps rose on his arms despite the fact that it was a warm day and he looked around, wondering if she took note of anything that had been happening around her. He knew that Hagrid must have been somewhere here, and, of course, Voldemort himself would have been. Wiping his eyes, George looked at the ground and gasped for colour shoots had burst from the ground, covering the scorched earth where it must have happened; signs of new life.

Almost hidden amongst the new plants was a small black stone. George stared down at it, his eyebrows furrowed slightly. It looked exactly like what he thought it was, but he shook his head, he was being stupid. Still, he bent down and picked it up, looking down at what he was quite sure was the Resurrection Stone.

He went to turn it over in his hands but quickly stopped himself. Instead, he slipped it into his pocket, just in case.


	4. The Second Brother

**_Six Years Later_**

George laughed quietly as he stared down at the pictures that Ron and Hermione had sent him. They had had their final holiday before the baby came and Hermione, being Hermione, had sent the entire family all the pictures that they had taken. He looked down at the one in his hand; it was of the two of them on a beach somewhere in Spain, grinning at the camera. He flicked through the other pictures, his eyes always drawn to the wedding rings that were sparkling on their fingers. Sighing, he dropped the pictures onto the kitchen table, grabbed his wand off the counter and walked down into the shop to find Teddy and Draco looking at the Pygmy Puffs with Ron.

"Uncle George!" Teddy yelled, running over to him, "Daddy said he'd finally get me a Puff!"

"Finally!" George exclaimed, "You can stop badgering me now!"

Draco sighed and shook his head, "Harry made the mistake of mentioning Fabio to him," an uncomfortable silence fell between them and George looked away.

"Excited for Lee's wedding?" Ron asked, breaking the silence.

"Oh, yeah," George lied, "Yeah, no, I can't wait,"

"I'm surprised I got an invite," Draco said quietly.

"Why wouldn't you?" Ron asked, frowning at him, "You're family, Draco, you know that,"

"I know," Draco muttered, "I just - hey, Teddy! Don't touch that!"

George muttered something about having admin work to do and retreated into the office, shutting the door shut behind him. He collapsed into the chair behind his desk and put his head in his hands. Lee and Alicia (finally) getting engaged and been great, and George was ridiculously happy for them, but he did wish that that Fred was there to see it. And he wished that Lydia was there so he wouldn't have to go on his own. There was nothing quite as depressing as walking into a wedding on your own.

He opened the desk drawer and rifled through it until he found the wedding invitation.

 _Together with their families_

 _Alicia and Lee_

 _Invite you to celebrate their marriage_

 _Saturday 30th July at Ewell Court House_

 _Reception to follow._

The door opened and Ron walked in, stifling a yawn. He looked down at the invitation and smiled.

"Should be a good day,"

"Yeah," George agreed, "Should be,"

Ron sighed, "Have you ever thought about - and don't get pissed off - have you ever thought about dating?"

"Has Hermione set you up to this?" George asked, a hint of amusement in his once. Both Molly and Hermione were obsessed on trying to marry him off.

"No!" Ron said, too quickly for it to be a believable lie, "Well, yes, but in my defence, Hermione is very scary when she's pregnant!"

"I haven't thought about dating," George said, "and I'm not going to think about dating,"

"It's been six years," Ron said quietly.

"I know,"

"Do you not think it's time to-"

"Don't tell me to move on," George snapped, "I don't want to move on,"

And he didn't move on, no matter how many people told him to. The media loved it. They loved the thought of George Weasley not moving on from his high school sweetheart. George Weasley was no longer the incredible Hogwarts dropout who had managed to turn his stupid pranks into a profitable business, he was George Weasley who was tragically heroic and had loved Lydia Potter so much that he wouldn't move on from her. And even though it seemed to be common knowledge that he would not move on, that didn't stop people from trying to get him to move on.

He had lost count of the amount of times that he had walked into the kitchen at The Burrow to find some woman that he had never met before sat at the kitchen table. And she always had a name that wasn't Lydia Potter, and she always worked with one of his brothers and he would always politely decline to go on a date with her because she wasn't his fiancée. The worst person he had come across in the kitchen was a girl with dark hair and green eyes. He had taken one look at her and marched straight back out of the kitchen. George knew that everything his family were doing was out of love, but he wished that they would just leave him bed.

"Don't move on then," Ron said, conceding defeat, "if that's what you want,"

"I'm very happy to die alone," George said bluntly.

When he was at Lee's wedding, however, George felt that maybe he didn't want to die alone. As Alicia walked up the aisle, arm in arm with her dad, tears sprang to his eyes. Luckily, he would be able to pass them off as happy tears, even though they were quite the opposite. For the past few years, George had done quite well in not thinking about his own wedding day, even when he had gone to all the other weddings, but as he stood besides Lee as best man, he couldn't help but think about what it would be like if the roles were reversed...if this was his wedding day.

For a moment, he could see her. He could see Lydia walking down the aisle with Harry, grinning brightly, and both Fred and Lee would be by his side, like he always imagined it would be. He supposed that by now, his mum and Hermione would be crying. Harry, Ron and Lydia would definitely be crying and, the more he thought about it, the more he thought that he would probably be crying the most out of everyone else.

In an ideal world, James and Lily would be there, too. And Remus and Sirius. Colin Creevey would most definitely be the wedding photographer. Lavender Brown would be there as well, and he liked to think that even Professor Babbling would turn up.

His fantasies of a wedding that would never take place lasted the whole of the service, and he was brought sharply back to earth by thunderous applause as Lee and Alicia kissed. George hastily plastered a bright smile onto his face and began to clap louder than anyone else before someone realised that something was terribly wrong with him and he was subjected to a counselling session for the rest of the day.

After they ate their way through five courses, George stood up to make his speech. As he looked out at the desks, he realised that this was more of a school reunion than anything else. Oliver Wood was sat with a good portion of the Gryffindor Quidditch team, Ron, Hermione, Harry and Draco were sat with Neville, Hannah, Seamus, Dean and Luna in what looked like a reunion of Dumbledore's Army. Professor McGonagall was sat with Professor Slughorn, Professor Flitwick and Professor Sprout, who was set to retire the next year.

And yet it still didn't feel right, because Fred and Lydia weren't there.

Still, he made it through his speech. He felt like it was a very good one; the correct amount of somber for those who could not be there with them, but enough laughs to make up for it. By the time he had finished, the entire room was clutching their sides from laughing so much and George felt like his old self again. The speech would have been funnier if Fred had been doing it with him, but it was good enough.

Later in the evening, when George sat at a table on his own, he realised that there was no saying that he would never get married and have a family, he just wouldn't be able to do any of it with Lydia. Angelina had been smiling a little too familiarly at him all day and even Bill had picked up on it, making a point of getting them to have a conversation alone. It had been awkward, she had been flirting with him and he was doing his best to try and act as though he hadn't noticed. He just didn't want to be in a relationship with anyone but Lydia. He wasn't sure if he was being stupid or romantic.

He took a gulp of beer and looked around, wondering what Fred would think if he was there with him. He'd be thrilled that Lee was married, but would be equally annoyed at George for doing thing but moping around and feeling sorry for himself. It was amazing, really, he had been at the wedding for almost six hours and had yet to be shouted at by his mum for misbehaving. If Fred were there with him, they would have gotten shouted at within three minutes of leaving the house. George sighed and drained his pint glass, wondering if it were wrong for the best man to sneak away from the wedding so early; he wasn't exactly being the life and soul of the party.

He looked over at Ron and Harry were dancing quite outrageously in the middle of the dance floor whilst Hermione and Draco looked on, shaking their heads at them. Luna and her Fiancé were stood to the side, both doing a peculiar dance that George couldn't work out if it was a joke or not. Knowing Luna, it would not be a joke and he highly doubted that Luna would marry someone who was anything close to normal. Despite the fact that he had decided he actually hated weddings, the thought of attending Luna's wedding was something that amused him to no end.

"You're unnervingly quiet, Mr Weasley, should I be worried you're planning something?"

George looked around just as Professor McGonagall sat in the seat next to him.

"No, I'm just being quiet for once," George replied, trying to keep the sadness out of his voice.

"I would offer you a biscuit, but I don't have my tin with me,"

Clearly, he had not been very successful at hiding his feelings but still managed a laugh, "I don't even think biscuits could make me feel better now," he said, watching a very giggly Neville and Hannah walk by.

"My husband died twenty years ago," she said.

"I never knew you were married,"

McGonagall smiled, "It was so long ago, sometimes I feel like it never happened. Like it was a figment of my imagination,"

"Yeah..." George muttered, "I know the feeling,"

"It doesn't get easier, but it also doesn't get any harder,"

"Merlin help me if it gets any harder," George sighed, rubbing his eyes, "it's their birthday tomorrow,"

July 31st was not an easy day, for any of them. Even though Lydia had been gone for six years, Harry refused to say that it was just his birthday. He would still 'our birthday,' and they would always write 'Happy Birthday Harry and Lydia,' on the cake. It was painful, but it made them feel like she wasn't so far away.

They sat and watched Harry for a while. He had picked up two year old James and was spinning him around on the dance floor, giggling loudly. Teddy ran up to them and threw his arms around Harry's middle, clinging onto him for dear life. George often wondered if Harry dealt with the loss of his own twin as badly as he did, but never found the courage to ask.

"I think I'm going to go to Godric's Hollow," George said, standing up, "it's almost midnight,"

McGonagall smiled at him sadly and nodded, "Give them my best,"

When George was sure that everyone was too drunk or too busy dancing to notice that he gone, he slipped out of the door and Apparated to Godric's Hollow. He came back to the little village twice a year - once on the anniversary of the Battle and then weeks later on Lydia's birthday. He always tried to go just when the clock struck midnight, because then he would never bump into someone he knew and the crowds would not start to form for hours.

He had fallen into a routine after coming so many times; he Apparated outside the Potter house and stayed there for a while before walking to the statue of the Potters that stood in the square. George would never stay there for long, it was too depressing and reminded him of the family life that he would probably never experience. Finally, he would walk to the cemetery and trace the similar path to the grave.

The headstone stood out in the darkness and George very slowly walked over to it. Even after all the times that he had been there, the sight of Lydia's name engraved below James and Lily's inflicted a kind of pain that even the Cruciatus Curse would never be able to achieve.

Sighing, George knelt down in front of the headstone and stared at it for a while, the words ' _The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death_ ' seemed to taunt him. Hermione had gently explained what it meant to him one day and even though it should have made him feel better, it didn't. It was a nice sentiment, saying that the dead had never really left them and that they were always there, but it wasn't really true, was it? It wasn't as though Fred could still help him with the shop, or he and Lydia could get married. They were still dead.

"Happy Birthday, Lydia," George said quietly, "You'd be twenty four today...it's not a particularly significant birthday, but it feels like it now that you're going. Tomorrow, we're all going to Harry and Draco's...and you should be there today. I wish you were coming. Everything is very lonely without you, these days.

"I've just come from Lee's wedding. Weddings are a bit shit, to be honest. They wouldn't be if you were here but you're not here so it was very shit. Hermione is still pregnant, and somehow pregnancy has made her more intense. Pretty sure you're the only person who would be able to talk her out of her moods, but you can't do that. Obviously," he laughed and ran a hand through his hair, "Angelina was flirting with me at the wedding. Didn't flirt back," he added, as though she was stood in front of him and glaring, "Didn't want too. Even I did, I don't actually think I can remember how to flirt,"

He sighed, "I should go, but McGonagall says hi. I'll speak to you soon,"

George stood up and flicked his wand so that a bunch of lilies appeared at the base of the headstone. He shoved his hands into his pockets and left the cemetery before Apparating home and feeling quite sorry for himself. He always felt worse after going to Godric's Hollow but he knew he would feel an unrelenting guilt if he didn't go, especially on their birthday.

Back in his flat, George found that he could not settle down. He moved from his bed, to the couch, to the kitchen table and then back to his bed. He was infuriating himself because all he wanted to do was go to sleep, but he couldn't relax even for a few seconds. He couldn't help but think about Fred and Lydia and how he wanted nothing more than to speak to them just one last time.

And then he realised that he could speak to them just one last time.

He leapt up from where he was sat on the couch and ran into his bedroom, yanking open one of the drawers. He rifled through all the useless things he still had not brought himself to throw away until he found what he was looking for: The Resurrection Stone.

It had stayed in that drawer for five years, gathering dust. George had never had the courage to use it, but now it was the only thing that he wanted to do. The Tale of the Three Brothers echoed around his mind, " _The second brother journeyed to his home where he took the stone and turned it thrice in hand. To his delight, the girl who he had once hopes to marry before her untimely death appeared before him_ ," but he wouldn't let himself think about how the story ended. He would not do what the second brother had done, he just wanted to see them both one last time. He would speak to them once and then throw the stone away.

Even though there was a part of his brain that was screaming at him to not do so, George turned the stone in his hand three times.

A bright light filled the room and George had to shield his eyes. It took a few seconds for his eyes to adjust to the brightness, but two figures soon came into focus and his eyes fell on Fred and Lydia. They looked exactly as they had done when they had died, but healthier and as though nothing had ever hurt them. Fred was still grinding as bright as he used to and Lydia's wand was still sticking out of her hair, but she looked ever so slightly sad.

"Georgie!" Fred exclaimed, "have you thought of better ear jokes yet?"

"N-no," George replied, unable to believe that he was actually speaking to his brother, "No, I haven't. I've been busy with the shop," he stared at his twin for a little while longer, "I miss you. Both of you. We all do,"

"We never left," Lydia said, "We've always been here," and she pointed at his heart.

George shook his head as tears began to stream down his face, "it's not the same. Harry really misses you, Lyds,"

Lydia smiled and nodded her head, "I know. I hope he doesn't hate me for what I did. I just wanted you to all have a better chance at life,"

"I don't have a better chance a life without either of you two," George snapped.

"Don't be an idiot, Georgie," Fred snapped, "we died so that you get a better chance at life. If you go and off yourself now, we'll have died for nothing! Everyone else who died will have died for nothing!"

"You're not mean to be on your own, George. Go and find someone. Fall in love. Have a family," Lydia said quietly, and George noticed that she wasn't meeting his eyes, "Do everything that we can't do,"

"There's no else, Lydia. You know there's no one else,"

"Yes, there is. Find her," she finally looked him in the eye, "Do it for me. I don't want you to be alone,"

"How can you tell me to do that when you're right there?" George snapped.

Lydia looked away from him and Fred cleared his throat, "You know that we're not actually here, mate. We can't be used as a replacement and you know that. You know how the Tale of the Three Brothers ends. Don't be the second brother,"

"I was born second, it's kind of hard not to be the second brother," George muttered. He heard Lydia laugh and he smiled through his tears.

"Georgie, seriously, you have to live," Lydia said, "you can't-"

"Don't tell me to move on, Lydia, please don't do that," George sobbed, "Would you move on if I were dead?"

"What I would do doesn't matter, George, I'm never going to be in this position,"

"And are you okay with it? With me moving on?"

Lydia looked away again and George knew what her answer would be. He wasn't sure how long he stayed with them, and he wasn't even sure what they were talking about, but it made him feel better. When the sun came up, George knew that he needed to go to sleep before going to Harry and Draco's house.

"Are you coming back?" Fred asked.

"Do you want me to?"

"It's not up to us," Lydia said.

George slipped the stone back into his drawer. He'd only use it if he absolutely needed it. He wouldn't become the second brother, Fred and Lydia were just being dramatic.

 _ **A/N: I'm sorry I've been taking so long to update, but life happened very quickly. I think I've gotten back into a better routine so I should be updating more often again!**_


	5. Uncle George

George ducked under a bunch of balloons that were hanging from the ceiling in Grimmauld Place and sat down at the kitchen table. Since they had moved in, Harry and Draco had tried to do everything that they could to make the house look completely different to the way that it had done when it had been used as the Order of the Phoenix. It had never really worked out all that well and George tried to avoid going as much as possible. It just reminded him of what life had been like before the war had broken out, when Fred and Lydia were still alive.

Of course, there weren't usually balloons hanging from the ceiling and, for the first time, George could walk around the house without feeling completely and utterly depressed. It was Teddy's tenth birthday and Draco had gone all out to make sure that Teddy would have the best birthday ever.

Almost every inch of the walls were covered in a banner that had some variation of, 'HAPPY BIRTHDAY, TEDDY!' in colour changing ink. Every corner had a bunch of blue balloons attached to them. Draco had even managed to attach a bunch of balloons to the portrait of Mrs Black. It had been a very tense ten minutes in which George had just stood on the stairs, holding his breath. Draco had achieved tying the balloons to the portrait without waking her up but when he and George started cheering, she woke up and did not stop screaming for hours. And George, being the best uncle out of them all, had organised a quite magnificent fireworks display for the end of the night. He had actually taken time off working in the shop to work on it, and he couldn't work out if this was a good thing or if he just needed to find a hobby outside of working and feeling sorry for himself.

Like most things, he decided not to dwell on it.

"Fucking hell!" Ron exclaimed, by way of greeting as he walked through the kitchen door holding baby Hugo in his arms, "Have you got enough balloons?"

"Don't swear in front of the babies, Ronald," Hermione snapped, following him in with two year old Rose hanging off her arm, "although," she added, looking around the room, "there are a lot of balloons,"

Draco glared at them both, "it's his tenth birthday! It's a big deal!"

"Is it?" Ron asked, "It's a good job Rosie and Hugo won't remember today or they'll be expecting something similar when they turn ten!"

"Honestly, Ron, with you as their dad I'm sure they won't grow up expecting much," George said.

"Shut up,"

As people began to arrive, George tried not to draw too much attention to himself. The ten year anniversary was drawing closer and it was not something that he wanted to think about. He did not want to think about how he had spent ten years on his own despite the fact that Lydia had told him not to.

"You're not meant to be on your own, George. Go and find someone. Fall in love. Have a family. Do everything that we can't do,"

Whenever he thought of that, he became irrationally angry at Lydia for ever suggesting such a thing. How could she expect him to fall in love with someone who wasn't her? How could she expect him to have a family with someone who wasn't her? As he leant back against the kitchen wall and watched Ron torment James and Rose, he found that all he really wanted was to be a dad, but he knew that there was no way he would ever be able to do that with anyone but Lydia.

He sighed and put his drink down, watching all his nieces and nephews cause general havoc. Hugo was fast asleep in Arthur's arms and Remus and Ruby, the two twins that Harry and Draco had just adopted, were both sat in Charlie's lap, looking up at him as though they weren't quite sure who he was.

Over the past ten years, the more of his siblings that had children, the less he became just 'George,'. Now, he was 'Uncle George,' more often than not. And whilst he was thrilled that his siblings had all found the love and happiness that they deserved, he still couldn't help but feel the vicious sting of jealously whenever another pregnancy or birth was announced. Perhaps he just wasn't ever meant to have a family. He watched as Charlie took Vicky into his arms and spun her around the room whilst she giggled loudly, he blonde hair flying behind her whilst Fleur looked on in a mixture of apprehension and amusement. Charlie had never had never gotten married or had kids, and he seemed perfectly happy. Whenever George looked at him he seemed to be grinning about something or other. So if Charlie was happy, why couldn't he be?

"Now, George, Percy works with a lovely young woman called Hannah" Molly said, walking over to him and he managed to not roll his eyes.

Over their mothers shoulder, Percy mouthed, 'sorry,' at him.

"Does he really?" George asked, "You know, I work with a not so lovely young man called Ronald,"

Molly shook her head, "It's been nearly ten years, Georgie,"

"I know how long to been, mum," George said stiffly, "and, please, don't tell me it's time to move on. I don't want to move on,"

She gave him a sympathetic look that he hated but soon became distracted by Dominique running over to her and shouting, "Grandma! Grandma! Grandma!" at the top of her voice. George took this as a chance to slip away from his mum and surround himself with people who weren't obsessed with setting him up with some random person. Though, as he sat down next to Hermione, he realised that there probably weren't that many people who weren't obsessed with setting him up. Before Hermione could start talking about someone she knew at work, he jumped back up again and left the kitchen, trying to find someone who wouldn't try and marry him off.

"Hey, George,"

He turned around to see Daphne and Urquhart walk through the front door. When he first looked at Daphne, he realised that she looked slightly different than usual but couldn't quite put his finger on it. She seemed to notice his confusion and smiled sheepishly at him, stroking her stomach.

"Pregnant?" He asked.

Urquhart nodded, "Pregnant,"

He stared at them for a little while longer and then remembered that he needed to look like he was actually happy for them. He forced a grin and hugged them both, trying to ignore the sinking feeling in his stomach. It seemed as though every single person around him was moving on with their lives and he was firmly stuck in the same place that he had been when he woke up on the May 3rd ten years ago.

George didn't go back into the kitchen with them straight away. The last thing he wanted was to be around when they shared the happy news. There was something quite depressing about people sharing news that you would never share. It was almost like the world was mocking him for never being able to move on from Lydia. Though, when he went back to the kitchen when he was sure that everyone had finished congratulation Daphne and Urquhart, he realised that he didn't want to move on and that was more than OK. His therapist did spend most of their sessions telling him that what he wanted was the most important thing in the world, after all.

When he walked back into the kitchen, there was a tugging on his robes and he looked down. James was staring up at him, holding up his arms. Forcing a smile onto his face, George stooped down and took him in his arms.

"What's up, mate?"

"Do you have a girlfriend, Uncle George?" James asked.

George couldn't help but laugh at this, "No, James, I don't have a girlfriend,"

"Oh..." He said quietly, he looked like he was deep in thought for a moment and then he nodded as though he had realised something, "So you have a boyfriend like my Daddies?"

"No, James, I don't have a boyfriend or a girlfriend," George replied, failing to keep the laughter out of his voice. Harry was stood besides them, laughing.

"Why?"

Harry immediately stopped laughing at this and glanced over at George, looking as though he was about to apologise but he waved him down.

"Because I don't want one," George told him.

James nodded again, "Neither do I!"

When James got bored of the conversation and ran off to torment Rose, Harry turned to him and looked apologetic.

"Sorry," he said, "He's at the age where he asks loads of questions,"

"Don't worry about it," George said dismissively, "it was cute,"

Harry smiled at him and then said quietly, "We're adopting another, you know,"

George stared at him in disbelief, "Do you not - do you not think you have enough? You already have four!"

"I know," Harry said, "but...they're orphans. I don't want them to end up like me and Lydia did..."

"I understand," he said, "but if you ever dump all five kids on me at once, I will have to punch you,"

"Completely understandable,"

"For fucks sake," George groaned when he opened his front door the next morning to find Rita Skeeter stood there, smiling at him expectantly, "Remind me why you have a job again?"

"Because my readers love me,"

"Your readers should probably go to St Mungo's then. I'm sure they could cook up a cure for stupidness," he snapped at her.

He locked his front door and carried on walking, inwardly screaming when he heard Skeeter's footsteps behind him. What he really wanted to do was turn around and curse her, but he felt like that would be bad for business. Instead, he just took longer strides in the hope that she would not be able to keep up with him.

"It's the ten year anniversary of the Battle of Hogwarts tomorrow," Skeeter said to him.

"Is it really? I hadn't noticed,"

"What are you thoughts about that?"

He turned around to face her, "what are my thoughts? What do you think my thoughts are? My brother and my Fiancée died, it wasn't the greatest of days,"

"But how do you feel now? How do you feel that you've progressed? Is there a chance of another Mrs Weasley?" She persisted, her Quick-Quotes quill moving so fast that it was a blur.

"There's more of a chance of Lydia Potter coming back from the dead then there is of me getting married," he snapped.

They arrived outside of the shop and George planted himself firmly between the shop door and Skeeter, "I'm going to go and do an honest day's work now, something you wouldn't know a lot about. Bye,"

He slammed the door shut behind him and stormed over to the counter where Ron was stood, flicking through some order forms and yawning loudly.

"Bad morning?" Ron asked.

"Skeeter is on the prowl again," he mumbled.

"Ah," Ron said, "did she ask any groundbreaking questions?"

"She asked if there was a chance of 'another Mrs Weasley,"

Ron made a face, "What did you say to that?"

"I told her that there's more of a chance of Lydia Potter coming back from the dead then there is of me getting married,"

They stared at each other for a while and then burst out laughing. This was the first time they had ever made such a joke about Lydia and George thought that maybe he had made some progress.

Any progress that had been made seemed to evaporate into nothingness on the day of the ten year anniversary. George had felt fully prepared for it in the days leading up to the second day in May, but when he woke up that morning, he realised that all the progress that he had made had been nothing but a lie to keep his therapist happy. He lay stiff as a plank in bed and found that he could not move his limbs. Or maybe he just didn't want to. He couldn't really tell the difference.

He knew that there was no getting out of it and that it was pointless to even entertain the idea. Whenever he had tried to skip the memorial service, some member of his family turned up at his door and forced him out of the house. It was usually Ginny, but she was playing Quidditch somewhere in France and didn't have the time to come over. George saw through her excuse straight away but did not say anything.

George lay in bed for as long as time allowed him too, staring up at the ceiling and trying to distract himself from whatever shit he was going to have to sit through that day. When the clock showed the time to be half twelve, he groaned and dragged himself out of bed, pulling the first robes he saw in his wardrobe over his head and not giving much thought to his appearance.

The day, as always, was long and painful. It was made even worse by the fact that it was the ten year anniversary and everyone kept on harping on about that. George stared at his knees for most of the service, not wanting to look up and stare at pictures of those who had died for an hour. Instead, he just tortured himself by thinking about all the things that Fred and Lydia had missed out on, and all the things that they had missed out on together.

He and Lydia never got to move in together or get married. Tears sprang to his eyes when he thought about how excited Lydia had been at the prospect of getting married and the look on her face when she had realised that he was proposing to her. He remembered how ecstatic Fred had been when he told her that Lydia had said yes and how he started talking above the stag do straight away, and where they would go. Now that he thought back on it properly, George realised how stupid they had been to ever entertain the idea that they could ever get married. They had both been stupid to think that they would ever make it down the aisle when such a violent war was being fought.

Often, George thought about what would have happened if Lydia knew that she was going to die. He wondered how different things would have turned out if after Sirius had died, Dumbledore had sat her down and explained that in order for them to truly defeat Voldemort, she would have to die. She would probably break up with him the moment that she could, say a quick goodbye to Ron, Harry and Hermione and be gone before any of them even knew what was happening.

It might have been easier that way.

The memorial finally came to an end and George jumped up from his seat, desperate to get away from it all. They walked into Hogsmeade and piled into the Three Broomsticks. It was never a particularly fun trip to the pub, but it was better than staying at Hogwarts and feeling sorry for themselves.

"Harry, can I speak to you?" George asked suddenly whilst they were stood at the bar.

"Everything OK?" Harry asked anxiously.

How - how hard is it to actually adopt kids?"

"When you're in a relationship with an ex-Death Eater a lot harder than usual, why?"

George glanced around to make sure that no one was listening.

"I...it sounds stupid but...I've always wanted kids and since, you know, since Lydia died I've never liked the thought of doing it with someone else but that doesn't - that doesn't mean that I never can, does it?" He said, "I could - I could do it alone,"

Harry frowned at him for a couple of minutes and then his face split into a wide grin, something that did not often happen on the day of the anniversary.

"I think that that might be the best idea you've ever had," Harry said, "I'll come round after school one day next week and get you sorted out, yeah?"

"Thanks, mate," George grinned, "but, um, don't tell anyone yet. I don't want mum or Hermione to freak out about something that might not happen,"

That evening when got George home in a strangely good mood, the first thing he did was go and get the Resurrection Stone. He didn't often use it, but he would feel terrible if he didn't use it today. He sat down in his living room and turned it over in his hands three times.

"Alright, Georgie?" Fred said, grinning as wide as ever.

Lydia did not say anything. She just did what she always did and smiled sadly at him.

"I, um, I need to tell you something," he said, suddenly nervous, "I think - I think I'm going to adopt a kid,"

Neither of them said anything straight away, and then Fred burst into laughter. George took this as meaning he thought it was a great idea, but was slightly worried about the fact that Lydia did not at all seem too happy about it.

"George, when you adopt this kid...you can't be obsessed with this stone. You'll have to move on," she said, "You won't ever be able to use it,"

"Why not?" George asked.

"Imagine what it would be like for them...growing up and talking to people who they'll never really know," she said, "if that doesn't mess with a kids head, I don't know what would,"

George knew she was right, but she wished that she wasn't.

 **A/N: Thank-you for reading! Reviews are always appreciated 3**


	6. A Christmas Miracle

"I'm sorry, Mr Weasley, but we can not allow you to adopt at this time,"

George managed to not swear out loud, because he felt like that would not help his case, but he was quite fed up of constantly hearing those words. He clenched his jaw for a moment but then managed to relax his face in a smile a nodded calmly at the social worker. He was starting to dislike Derek because had had yet to give George good news, despite the fact that Harry and Draco had promised that he would be able to work something out for him. Draco had been the first to point out that if Derek had managed to convince the Ministry to allow an ex- Death Eater to adopt a baby with his husband, then he would be able to pull the same thing off for George.

"Can I just ask why this is so difficult?" George asked finally, "You said it would take a couple of months at most. It's been nine months,"

"I know, and I'm sorry," Derek replied, and he seemed genuine.

"I don't understand," George said, "I don't have a criminal record, I have a house, a stable income, you've done background checks on all my family members, you've spoken to school teachers...what are the Ministry expecting to find?"

Derek sighed and lit a cigarette, which only made George want to punch him - he was like a walking cliche. He didn't say anything straight away and then turned to look at George again.

"The Ministry are rather put off by the fact that you have a close relationship with Draco Malfoy and the fact that you would be a single parent,"

George rolled his eyes, "'A close relationship with Draco Malfoy,'? Are they for real? We're family! And they let him adopt a bunch of kids!"

"I know, I know," Derek said, "but that doesn't put the fact that they're put off by it all. The Wizarding World has been through a lot these past ten years-"

"Do you not think I'm aware of that?" George snapped, "these past ten years haven't been the best of my life, you know!"

"I know that, Mr Weasley," Derek said gently, "however, what I was trying to say was that the Ministry are trying to push the perfect family unit at the moment, and a single dad who has an ex-Death Eater for a brother in law isn't the perfect family unit. The theory is is that if those who lost people during the war can move on and can find love and the perfect family, then anyone can,"

George sighed and flopped back in his chair, "Who gives a shit about me, though? I'm not one of the Children who Lived, I wasn't on the run with them-"

"The media loves you, Mr Weasley and you know that," Derek said, speaking over him, "The Daily Prophet is obsessed with you, and don't give me that look-" he added furiously, "because you know it's true. I want you to be able to adopt a child. I want you to have the family that you've always wanted, but I can only do so much,"

"I know that," George said, "I know. Is there anything that could speed up this process? Anything at all?"

Derek shrugged, "The only thing that would speed it up is if you were married or in a long-term relationship,"

"I am in a-"

"With someone who is alive,"

George folded his arms, "I'm not marrying anyone else,"

"Then the only thing you can do is wait,"

Snow was falling thick and fast by the time George left the adoption agency. Scowling at the sky, he pulled his hood over his head and shoved his hands in his pockets, hurrying down the street and trying to find somewhere to Apparate out of the view of Muggles. He had considering trying to adopt from a Muggle agency, but Draco had very quickly shot down that idea when he pointed out that the background check would be too dangerous and bringing up a Muggle baby in a world of magic was just cruel.

George had never said this out loud to anyone, but there had been a number of times in the past ten years where had had considered leaving magic behind forever and moving into the Muggle world. He was relatively sure that he would be able to get by in the Muggle world on his own. He felt as though he had been around Lydia, Harry and Hermione enough to understand how it all worked.

All of these thoughts quickly disappeared from his mind when he got back to the shop. He knew that there was no way that he would ever be able to turn his back on this. Not after all the work that he and Fred had put in to make it happen. And he knew that he would never be able to walk away from a world that Lydia had died for, to do so would be an insult to her memory.

"Where've you been?" Ron demanded when George ducked behind the counter with him, "You said you'd be in at half past three! You're an hour late!"

"Who promoted you to manager?" George asked.

Ron glared at him, "if you haven't noticed, the shop is packed and we only have five other people on. And two of them are trainees! It's been a nightmare! The same person spilt three portable swamps and set off some fireworks!"

"If there's not a bit of chaos in a joke shop, then it's not really a joke shop, is it? It's just a shop," George said, clapping him on the back, "You can leave early if you want, I can handle this lot," he gestured absentmindedly to the customers.

"No, you can't,"

"Yes, I can. How do you think I survived when you were off being an Auror?" George said to him, "Go home,"

"See you tomorrow, then,"

His shift passed by quickly but by the end of it, he felt thoroughly depressed. They were inching closer and closer at Christmas and it was his least favourite time of year. It wasn't always this way. He used to love Christmas but now that he was alone, the novelty had worn off. There really was nothing quite as crushing as waking up to a house in complete silence where there could have been excited children running around in a different life.

Sometimes, when the silence felt too heavy and as though it was closing in on him, George found it much easier to close his eyes and retreat into a world where the war had not happened. It was better to think back to better times than to live in the not-so-happy present.

" _Fuck Potions. Fuck school. Fuck OWLs and, most of all, Fuck Professor fucking Severus fucking Snape!" Lydia yelled out of nowhere._

 _George jumped in his seat and looked over at her. She was sat on the hearth by the fire, surrounded by books. Harry look bemused, Ron looked slightly terrified and Hermione was clearly trying (and failing) to calm her down. Fred sniggered as she chucked a potions book behind her and it accidentally smashed through the window. Hermione groaned and flicked her wand so that the book came back through the window and the glass then slotted back into the window pane._

 _"Please, Lydia, for the love of Merlin, stop smashing windows," Hermione said._

 _"Or don't," Harry said, "it's an endless source of amusement for me,"_

 _Hermione rolled her eyes and shoved the book back into Lydia's hands with the instruction to keep on reading. George watched her for a little while longer, more than aware that another outburst was due any second now,so he decided to act on it before it was too late._

 _"Where are you going?" Fred asked when George got to his feet, "These Love Potions aren't going to make themselves!"_

 _"I'll be back in a minute," George called over his shoulder as he ran up the stairs to his dormitory two at a time. He flung the door open to find it empty, except for Kenneth Towler who was lay on his bed, reading a book._

 _"What do you want?" Kenneth asked. For some reason, he had never been too fond of either Fred or George, and George had a feeling it was due to all the pranks they had pulled on him throughout the years._

 _"For you to get lost," George said brightly._

 _Kenneth dropped his book on his chest, "This is my dormitory too,"_

 _"I know, but Lydia needs a place to revise that isn't loud,"_

 _"I'm not moving for your girlfriend, Weasley. Get her to study in her own dormitory," he snapped._

 _Somewhere beneath them, there was another crash, the sound of Lydia swearing at the top of her voice and Harry and Ron howling with laughter. George turned back to Kenneth with a look that quite plainly said, "I told you so,'. Kenneth rolled his eyes and got up, shoving past George._

 _"Learn to control you girlfriend," he snapped._

 _George rolled his eyes at the back of his head, "the fact that you think girlfriends need to be 'controlled' is probably the reason you've been single for seven years, mate,"_

 _"Fuck you, Weasley!"_

 _As George followed him down the stairs, he realised that he was going to miss tormenting Kenneth everyday. Maybe he would offer him a job at the shop just so he could get his daily fill. When George got back into the common room, Lydia was lay flat on her back, her hands covering he face. As soon as Hermione saw him walking over, she let out a sigh of relief._

 _"She's your problem now," Hermione said, picking up her book and burying her face in it._

 _George gently nudged Lydia with his foot until she opened her eyes and looked up at him._

 _"If you ask me to plant Dungbombs in the Slytherin common room, I will tell you to fuck off," she muttered, closing her eyes again._

 _"I wasn't going to ask you that," he said, "I was going to tell you that my dormitory is empty so you can go and revise their in the peace and quiet. It'll be a lot better than trying to work down here,"_

 _"There's no good place to work," she said, "but help me up,"_

 _She made a great show of walking as slowly as possible to the stairs whilst George carried her stuff for her. It soon became obvious that she wasn't putting any of this on and she really was as quiet as she was acting; their were deep bags under her eyes and she was yawning after almost every sentence._

 _"How many hours of sleep have you had?" George asked her when she flopped down onto his bed and looked as though she would never move again._

 _"I don't know," she muttered, "I had detention with Umbridge last night and that didn't finish until midnight. Then I had to write an essay for Sprout which took me about three hours, but then I had to wake up at half five to finish an essay for Flitwick so...two and half hours?"_

 _"Why don't you have a nap instead of-"_

 _"I will nap when I'm dead," Lydia cut across him, "and I need to pass my OWLs,"_

 _"Missing one day of work isn't going to mean you fail all your OWLs, is it?" George pointed out to her._

 _"Don't take this the wrong way, but I'm not going to take exam advice off you,"_

 _"Good call," George said, "I have three OWLs to my name,"_

 _"If I'd have known how much work OWL year was going to be, I might have let Voldemort kill me last summer," Lydia sighed._

 _The smile melted off George's face at these words. He hated how flippantly she would talk about everything last summer, because he knew that it was just a way to hide how she truly felt about it all. He knew that she was terrified about a possible war breaking out, and terrified that she would lose her dad again, especially when she had just gotten him back. But she would never say this out loud and reverted back to acting as though the whole thing was one big joke._

 _"Don't say that," George said quietly, "You know it's not true,"_

 _Lydia muttered something under her breath and then sat up, smiling at him, "I know it's not true, but studying for exams seems a bit pointless when Lord Voldemort is skulking around somewhere, trying to come up with a plan to kill me and Harry,"_

 _'I know," George said, "which is why you should probably have a nap instead of working. You need to sleep more than you need to revise,"_

 _Lydia shook her head, "No, it's fine. I'm going to revise and then I'm going to nap all weekend,"_

 _"Alright," George said, kissing her, "I'll see you later. And if you're going to destroy anything in this room out of stress, please destroy Kenneth's bed,"_

 _"Which one is that?" Lydia asked._

 _"The one opposite mine," George said, "he said I should control you before,"_

 _"Ew," Lydia said, scrunching up her nose, "what a weirdo,"_

 _"And I had to live with him since I was eleven!"_

 _"My heart breaks for you,"_

 _"It should!" George said as he left the room._

 _"If Lydia blows up our dormitory now, I'm gonna kill you," Lee said when George sat back down with him and pulled his parchment back towards him._

 _"I specifically told her to fuck with Kenneth's stuff, I'm sure we'll be fine,"_

 _Fred nodded, "good idea. Anyway, this Love Potion..."_

 _They soon got lost in trying to come up with a decent Love Potion, and it was proving to be more difficult than they though. Fred didn't want to use Armotentia because so many Love Potions that were on the market already did, but George felt like it was their best bet, because it was the strongest one there was and they would probably be able to put their own twist on it if they tried hard enough._

 _When they couldn't work out how to come up with their own, they instead began to amuse themselves by thinking of all the different names they could give to a range of love potions, each one as sickening as the last - 'Cupid Crystals,' , 'Kissing Concoction', , 'Beguiling Bubbles,' were the ones that made them want to throw up the most._

 _"Don't you have a bottle of Armontentia somewhere?" Lee asked, "Go and get it and we'll see what we can do with it,"_

 _"I don't have it," Fred said._

 _"I do," George said, getting up again, "it's somewhere upstairs, I'll go and find it,"_

 _"Wait!" Fred called to him, grabbing his arm and yanking him back. He lowered his voice and glanced around the room, "Have you told Lydia that we're dropping out yet?"_

 _"No," George said._

 _"Why?" Fred groaned, "We have two weeks left! You said you wanted to tell her before we actually went!"_

 _"I know!" George said, "I know, I'll tell her,"_

 _It wasn't that he didn't want to tell her, because he did. He was just slightly worried that she'd be pissed off with him and had kept on putting it off. He knew he would have to tell her soon, because she would definitely be more pissed off at him if he just left unannounced. Back upstairs, the dormitory was not destroyed and Lydia was sat cross legged on his bed, coincidentally smelling the Amortentia with a peculiar look on her face._

 _"That's where that is!" He exclaimed, "wait, what does that smell of?"_

 _"Fireworks, chocolate and pastries, why?"_

 _He grinned at her and sat on the other side of the bed, leaning against the bedpost, "Do you know what it is?"_

 _"Why would I know what it is? It's a potion," she said, "I don't do potions well. We all know that,"_

 _"It's Amortentia. It's a love potion," he explained, "it smells different do everyone because it smells of what attracts them the most,"_

 _"Oh," Lydia said, looking genuinely impressed._

 _"For example," he continued, "I smell...your perfume, that smokey smell after a duel and fresh laundry. And since we've basically just confessed our undying love for each other, I need to talk to you about something,"p_

 _"If you've blown the Slytherin common room up..." She said, looking at him with narrowed eyes._

 _"Why must you always assume the worst?" He asked, but before she could answer he carried on talking, "Fred and I are dropping out of school - wait -" he said, just as she opened his mouth to interrupt him, "it's because we found premises for the joke shop and we have a plan and we have more than enough product to start and we have a team of people helping us make everything,"_

 _He looked at her and laughed, "Lyds, this could actually work!"_

 _She stared at him for a moment and George felt his heart sink, she was not at all reacting in the way that he had hoped. He opened his mouth to try and form a better defence but before he could say anything, Lydia had thrown her arms around his neck. They both fell backwards of the bed and_ , _quite painfully, crashed to the floor._

 _"So, you're not pissed off about it?"_

 _She sat up and looked down at him, grinning,_ _"Pissed off? Why would I be pissed off? This is what you've both wanted for ages!"_

 _"So we should go for it?" He asked, suddenly serious._

 _"You're the one who's always telling me to go for stuff even if it could blow up in my face,"_

 _George looked up at her and grinned, "I love you,"_

 _"I love you, too_ ,"

George opened his eyes again, his face wet with tears. If he had known then what he knew now, then he thought that he might not have stayed with Lydia for as long as he did. But the more he thought about that, the more he knew that he would never change a thing. He couldn't imagine ever actually sitting down with her and breaking up with her. He ran a hand through his hair and sighed, he couldn't even remember what it was like to sit down with her and talk to her. He couldn't even remember what it was like to sit down with his own twin brother and talk about something.

"Just focus on getting through Christmas, Georgie," he whispered to himself, "don't focus on them,"

He did try his best to get through the Christmas period, but now the he was trying to adopt, it was getting harder and harder. His weekly meetings with Derek were gradually getting more and more depressing because every time he went, he was delivered bad news. He was starting to think that he would never be a dad and should probably just give up on it. It had been a ridiculous idea in the first place.

And it was with a heavy heart that he went to their final meeting of the year on Christmas Eve. He already knew what to expect and felt quite numb when he sat down in the chair opposite Derek's desk.

"Well, Mr Weasley, I have some news for you,"

"Do you?" George asked, not even letting himself to get excited about anything.

"You've been approved to adopt,"

"I've been approved to what?" George asked, thinking that this must be some kind of sick joke.

"You've been approved to adopt a baby boy," Derek said, smiling. He reached into his desk and pulled out a file, pushing it towards him, "His name is...well, his name is Fred,"

"You've got to be kidding!" George exclaimed.

"He's sixth months old. Unfortunately, his parents died in some sort of a freak accident, and they have no other surviving family members," Derek explained, "if you look through there, there will be a picture of him,"

George immediately flipped the file open, and his eyes fell on a picture of a baby. A picture of _his_ baby with dark hair and bright blue eyes, staring up at the camera. Tears immediately sprang to his eyes and, for the first time in ten years, he felt as though he had something to live for again.

 ** _A/N: - Once again, I'm sorry that uploads have been few and far between. I'm in a weird stage at the moment where I hate everything that I write, but I'm working on getting out of that. Anyway, I hope you've enjoyed!_**


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